Racing
© Morio
Red Bull will run an older conventional rear wing on Max Verstappen’s and Isack Hadjar’s cars at the Belgian Grand Prix after linking Verstappen’s crashes in Austria qualifying and the Silverstone race to problems with the newer “Macarena” wing.
According to the team’s assessment, the issue came when the rear wing failed to close properly at the end of a Straight Mode zone. In both incidents, Verstappen suddenly lost downforce on corner entry at high speed and was sent off the road.
The decision is a significant one for Spa-Francorchamps because the rotating wing was designed to be especially effective on tracks with long straight-line sections. Red Bull first introduced the concept in Miami after Ferrari had pioneered it, using a fuller rotation to create a larger opening, cut drag and improve top speed and efficiency.
Spa is exactly the kind of circuit where that advantage matters most. Straight Mode can be used in five zones there, which makes Red Bull’s retreat from the newer design all the more notable. Verstappen acknowledged the trade-off, saying the older wing could be “maybe a little slower, but it won’t turn the world upside down.”
Speaking before the weekend, Max Verstappen, Red Bull’s four-time world champion, said the switch was the obvious choice. “I think it was clear to everyone that for this weekend it was the smartest thing to do,” he said. He added that the team now has to “figure out how we find the solution to the problems” and hopes “the other rear wing is back on the car again soon.”
Red Bull has made the change on both cars, even though Hadjar had not reportedly experienced the same problem with the newer wing. The team has instead chosen to standardize on the proven older specification while it works through the fault.
The rear-wing issue has also drawn FIA attention, with the governing body’s technical department reviewing the opening-and-closing mechanism as a routine safety measure. For Red Bull, that leaves reliability and safety overriding outright straight-line gain at one of the fastest and least forgiving tracks on the calendar.