Ross Brawn expects his team’s BGP 001 to be faster at the next race at the Nurburgring in Germany. The team principal’s comments come after a drubbing by Red Bull at Silverstone in the last race, and rumours that Red Bull’s development might be outpacing that of the Brackley team.
But Brawn said Silverstone had been a one-off, more connected to a problem with certain tyres than to any long-term pace problem.
“With the confusion over the tyres, we didn’t run some new pieces we had because Friday (at Silverstone) was very difficult with the tyre temperature,” Brawn is quoted as saying by the Daily Telegraph.
“We couldn’t determine how the new bits were working, so we decided to avoid confusion and went back to what we had in Turkey [ where Brawn themselves trounced the opposition],” said the ex-Ferrari man.
Ominously for the rest of the teams, Brawn’s development of the car has not let up either.
“So we’ve got those bits and we have some new improvements for the Nurburgring,” finished Brawn.
Jenson Button still comfortably leads the standings from team-mate Rubens Barrichello and Red Bull charger Sebastian Vettel, who is expected to derive a boost from the first time racing in a competitive car on home soil. Nigel Mansell once said home advantage was worth a tenth of a second per lap, and with the current margins between the teams so small, it could prove a factor.