Soldato
Great post don’t agree with all of it, but still, a really great post.Not dismissing/ignoring your first point about the breach, I just think we can't really comment on it as it's impossible to quantify the advantage it gave - so I'd rather table that, for this discussion.
However, I agree that it's similar to the advantage that Mercedes had at the beginning of the hybrid era, just with their engine really. I also think that due to the cost cap, the FIA has limited themselves in terms of being able to simply ban X & Y - as if many teams have already committed substantial budget to it, you can't do a U-turn, just from a monetary standpoint anymore.
I honestly don't have the answers for the teams, I just know that it's extremely evident (even just from a body language standpoint during interviews etc) that most of the teams are struggling to do their job. I mean Toto has now gone to the length multiple times of admitting that 1) it took them way to long last year to just accept they were wrong and 2) that they are still struggling to understand why they were wrong, the first point especially is a great example of a very poorly run business. We see it with Ferrari all the time, the constant firing and hiring of managers, their refusal to change their internal processes etc.
I suppose that's the difference, in my eyes, between them and Red Bull. In my many decades of watching & working in F1 (I'm the wrong side of 50 unfortunately, retired), I've never seen a team able to adapt and react as quickly as RBR do - even when they're behind. I mean when Vettel won their engine was down on power to all the others and they constantly innovated elsewhere to make up for it.
That's why I don't like seeing the "toxic culture/company" comments about RBR, as it's just clearly not true. You can't function as a team at as high a level as they do, consistently, without a strong team ethic etc. That doesn't excuse anything that's happened recently, obviously.
And I agree, I don't think anyone can come even close to RBR/Max until the upcoming engine change, which will shake everything up naturally - this doesn't bode well for competitive racing necessarily but it's still quite the engineering feat, to create something that dominate. I like that in a way, even if I want to see wheel to wheel action. I'm a retired engineer though, so naturally, I want to appreciate the machine itself, as well as the driver in it and the team that built it.
