Red Bull admits RB18 F1 car will look different at first race

Red Bull unveiled its new car on Wednesday afternoon online as the start of the new season gets closer and closer.

2021 F1 champion Max Verstappen will look to defend his crown this season alongside Sergio Perez. 

F1 embarks on entirely new technical regulations for 2022 with drastic changes to the design of the cars.

“Because it’s new regulations it’s going to evolve very, very quickly,” Horner said at the launch of Red Bull’s 2022 challenger.

“I mean, I think by the time we get to the first race the car is not going to look very much like this. And I think the evolution will be very, very quick, as we progress through the season.”

For 2022, all teams have to work under a $145 million budget gap meaning the bigger teams will have to think more carefully about how they allocate resources to car development.

Horner expects the car to change on a race-by-race basis with it constantly evolving throughout the season.

“The car is a prototype, basically at every race, it’s evolving,” Horner added. “It will probably never run in the same configuration twice, it’s just constantly evolving.

“Now, we have to do that within the framework of the financial regulations, so we’ve got to be really choosy on where we’re going to spend our money to develop this car this year.”

The RB18 will take to the track for the first time in anger later this month when pre-season testing at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya gets underway.

The 2022 season starts in Bahrain on March 16-18.