Red Bull like an “old duck paddling frantically” in 2023

In brief

Newey says Red Bull have overcome “lots” in 2023

Sergio Perez and Max Verstappen have won all five of grands prix between them so far this year for Red Bull. But Newey said the team have had to overcome “lots” during the season already to achieve that.

“It’s the old duck paddling frantically,” he told the team’s podcast this week, “it might look smooth on the top, but it’s not been so smooth underneath.”

“We had a few reliability concerns coming out of the Bahrain test, so there’s always things that kind of you’re always worrying about things. Reliability, performance as well. Melbourne, we struggled to switch the tyres on, particularly on Friday. Got a little bit more on top of it by qualifying, but it certainly wasn’t an easy ride.”

Former McLaren figure praises Hamilton’s wheel-to-wheel demeanour

Sam Michael, the former sporting director of McLaren and technical director of Williams, has praised Lewis Hamilton for his ‘clean’ style of racing, particularly in his rivalry with Max Verstappen.

“Lewis has always been a clean driver. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him do something that you’d think ‘oh, that was dirty’,” Michael told the official F1 website.

“Even looking at the recent stuff with him and Max, he goes out of his way to not do stuff. So he might do things where, I don’t know, the pushing off the track and stuff. But that’s not putting the car into a position where it’s like ‘you do this and we crash’. You don’t see Lewis do that, do you?”

Hamilton and Verstappen have touched wheels several times in recent years. The pair infamously tangled at Silverstone in 2021, a collision which Hamilton was penalised for. Verstappen was given a penalty when they collided again at Monza that year and again when they tangled in Jeddah.

They seldom met on track during 2022. However they did make contact at Interlagos, where Verstappen was penalised again.

Sainz shuts down injury claims

Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz Jnr has rubbished suggestions he picked up an injury ahead of this weekend’s Monaco Grand Prix.

In the week leading up to the race it is tradition for a charity football match to take place in AS Monaco’s ground Stade Louis II between two teams that feature past and present Formula 1 drivers. Some shared their concern online when they saw Sainz had to have a leg strapped up following an incident during this year’s match.

Speculation Sainz had injured himself and put his race participation at risk prompted him to take to social media to say otherwise. “I am well and completely ready to race this weekend in Monaco,” he said. “What happened yesterday was simply a contact during the traditional charity football [match], but it was not an injury. I enjoyed…