F1 News

Horner angry about 'very similar clone of our car' from Aston Martin

20 May 2022 at 13:30
Last update 20 May 2022 at 15:43
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  • GPblog.com

Aston Martin appeared in Spain with an almost completely new car that did look very much like the Red Bull Racing RB18. Christian Horner doesn't sound very happy and suspects defecting employees helped make this copy.

Aston Martin is not entirely unfamiliar with making copies of other cars on the grid. The former Racing Point did the same to Mercedes. This turned out to be illegal and resulted in a points deduction for the team. The new Aston Martin that the team showed up with in Spain this week looks very much like Red Bull Racing's car.

Horner vitriolic

Horner is not happy with the clone built by the rival team. Andrew Benson of the BBC quotes the team boss: "It's quite a thing to instruct your team to build a very similar clone of our car. Some of the staff have switched over during the winter period and you can't control what they bring with them in their heads."

Without getting very angry and threatening complaints to the FIA, Horner is already condemning Aston Martin's car. It is likely that the eyes of the team of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez will be tightly focused on Aston Martin's times this weekend. If the similarities are too big and the times have improved so much at Aston Martin, Horner will not leave it at that, judging by this testimony.