“Making love to his exhaust” – Christian Horner baffled by McLaren’s Austrian GP stamina

Christian Horner admits he is baffled by the way McLaren is mastering F1’s technical regulations this season to prevent extreme tyre wear at hot tracks like Austria.

The Red Bull boss watched as his team’s 77-race point-scoring streak was ended after Max Verstappen crashed out and Yuki Tsunoda finished last in the Austrian Grand Prix. The race was won by McLaren’s Lando Norris, who was pushed to the line by his team-mate Oscar Piastri, who now as a 15-point lead in the drivers’ standings.

After the race, Horner admitted that he could not get his head around how McLaren was able to produce a car that can run so close behind another without suffering damage to its tyres.

“What's truly impressive, and for me I can't see any other team being able to do it, is when you look at how close Oscar is able to run behind Lando with a car fat on fuel at the beginning of the race,” Horner said.

“He's basically making love to his fucking exhaust pipe for lap after lap after lap, and the tyres are not dying. I mean, that to me is, you know, that is their advantage.

Christian Horner, Red Bull Racing

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

“They've managed to create a car that really protects its tyres very well and obviously has a good balance. I can't see any other car that would be able to follow that closely and not grain the front tyres or the rear tyres. I don't really understand.”

Horner was left reflecting on a miserable weekend at the Red Bull Ring after watching on as Verstappen was wiped out by Mercedes rookie Andrea Kimi Antonelli in the opening lap of the race.

“Well, that was a home race to forget,” he added. “We got unlucky [in qualifying], that then puts us in a position where you're in the crash zone, and Kimi just lost it in spectacular fashion up at Turn 3. 

“Max was basically through the corner and getting back on the power, and just got wiped out, so, an unfortunate mistake by Kimi, he's apologised to Max, but, you know, for us it killed our afternoon.”