Red Bull Team Principal Shares Reason For Not Giving Leclerc His Position Back

Tuesday, 21 November 2023 at 14:00

Christian Horner explained why the team did not order Max Verstappen to give Charles Leclerc his position back after the turn-one incident.

Red Bull Racing F1 driver Max Verstappen started the 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix in the second position behind Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc in pole position.

With a better start of the line, the three-time world Champion got alongside Leclerc with an inside line into turn one.

However, it seemed like he misjudged his breaking point and ended up going wide and taking the Ferrari driver with him outside of the track.

Read also

WATCH: Verstappen & Leclerc Joke About Their 'Inchident' At Las Vegas Grand Prix

Leclerc was the driver in front going into the corner, so Verstappen should have let him back according to the rules, but he didn't, for which he later received a second penalty. Christian Horner told the media:

"I thought it was a great race, and if you look at it from our perspective, we picked up a penalty in the first turn that was marginal."

Even though he received a five-second penalty, the Flying Dutchman still won the race in the end. The Red Bull team principal explained in the eyes of his team, both drivers went wide.

"We thought it was marginal under the guise of 'let them race' and both cars ran wide, but that obviously put Max on the back foot a little on the Medium tire."

It is often the case that drivers will not be punished for hard racing in the first few corners which is what Horner relates to by "let them race". He added:

"It was 50-50, both guys ran wide at the first turn, Max was slightly ahead, and we thought that within the realms of: 'let them race in the first few corners. That was why we didn't reverse [the cars], and he had to do it the hard way'"

Verstappen then struggled on the medium compound tires, allowing Leclerc to catch up and overtake the Dutchman in a matter of few laps.

Verstappen then had a lot of work to catch up with the race lead on hard compound tires. Horner thinks the three-time World Champion did an outstanding job.

"We were not as competitive as Ferrari, we were a bit harder on the tires, but on the Hard, the car came alive a lot, despite the damage with George. It was an outstanding job to close the leaders down and win the race."