Data revealed: Can Red Bull Racing’s Imola upgrades bring the heat to McLaren?

The Red Bull team arrived in Imola with a significant upgrade package, aiming to reduce the gap to McLaren and help Max Verstappen keep his championship fight alive.

But did these upgrades actually bring any visible results on track? Telemetry data will help us analyse that.

Red Bull start the European season with upgrades

The Enzo e Dino Ferrari circuit and the beginning of the European tour is the perfect time and place for upgrades; teams’ factories are much closer to the track, which simplifies logistics and reduces costs.

In addition, Imola is a highly representative circuit, and its characteristics make it an excellent location to test new parts and gather useful data.

Almost every team introduced some updates to their cars, with Red Bull standing out the most due to some very noticeable changes.

This upgrade primarily includes a new sidepod inlet design, now very similar to that of McLaren and Ferrari. We also saw a very unique mirror mount design – something not utilized before on the grid.

It’s also worth noting that the RB21 received a new floor last weekend in Miami, which is now used by both drivers.

Emilia Romagna Grand Prix preview

👉 A shock home win? Four bold predictions for the Imola GP

👉 The new evidence that shows McLaren’s brake cooling philosophy

But is all of this enough to close the gap to McLaren?

After the first two practice sessions before the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, the fastest lap times show that the gap is still there.

Max Verstappen posted the fifth-fastest time in FP2, with a deficit of 0.442 seconds compared to the quickest lap by Oscar Piastri.

Since lap times in FP2 were significantly better than in FP1 and the session is generally more representative of the true order, we’ll focus on data from that session.

Comparing their laps, we can see that Verstappen lost the most time through T1 and T2, and later again through T7 – the well-known Tosa corner. At that point, the gap between him and Piastri had already grown to over half a second.

However, from Acque Minerali (Turns 11–13) to Variante Alta (Turns 14–15), Max managed to stay with Piastri, not allowing the gap to increase further.

Currently, the only area where the RB21 is actually better is in top speed on the straights – but on a track like this, that advantage isn’t too impactful.

The main goal of Red Bull’s upgrade package was drag reduction, even though their drag wasn’t particularly problematic earlier in the season.

We can expect this advantage to show more clearly on other circuits. Until then, it seems McLaren still holds all the cards.

The papaya team’s stability and grip through corners remain at a level above the rest of the field.

The clearest indicator of their track advantage is the ideal lap time chart below. If we combine the best sectors of each driver, the gap between Norris and the next fastest non-McLaren driver is just under half a second. The gap to Verstappen is even larger – over 0.6 seconds.

On a relatively short and fast circuit like Imola, these are massive differences.

Unfortunately for fans of the Austrian team, the story continues in the race pace simulations.

The papaya drivers were once again P1 and P2 with a significant margin over the rest. They too arrived in Europe with an upgrade package, though it seems that the high-downforce rear wing and beam wing they officially submitted as part of the update weren’t actually used on track.

It’s likely we’ll see them next weekend in Monaco.

Can anyone stop them?

Of course, it will be extremely difficult for anyone to match McLaren’s performance – but not impossible.

The most important session of the weekend will be Saturday, and everything is still to play for; the other teams still have a chance to beat the British team. And if there’s one thing we’ve learned by now, it’s never to count Verstappen out in qualifying.

Pole position at Imola will be more valuable than usual. This old-school circuit is narrow and, apart from T1 after the DRS zone, doesn’t offer many overtaking opportunities.

On top of that, we’ve seen throughout this season that being in clean air matters more than ever.

We also need to factor in the new compound Pirelli has prepared for this and the next race – the C6.

As the softest compound, C6 has a very narrow operating window, and teams were still struggling to find it during the practice sessions – they’ll get another shot tomorrow, as no team has previous data on this compound.

Read next: Small upgrades, big gains? Mercedes introduce a handful of new components at Imola