Red Bull deny breaking testing rules

2011 F1 season

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Red Bull say they did not break testing rules when Neel Jani drove the RB7 in Spain on Sunday.

The Swiss driver told his Twitter followers the test took place at “a track outside Barcelona” believed to be the Idiada facility where Virgin recently tested with GP3 driver Adrian Quaife-Hobbes.

Jani added the test included “straight line and high speed cornering”. The sporting regulations limit teams to a maximum of four one-day aerodynamic tests carried out on FIA-approved straight-line or constant-radius sites.

A Red Bull spokesperson said the test was within FIA rules, saying:

“We did not complete high speed cornering and tested within the permitted regulations – which is an aero test carried out on FIA approved straight line or constant radius sites.”

Red Bull added that Jani’s Twitter account had been updated for him by a third party.

2011 F1 season


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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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48 comments on “Red Bull deny breaking testing rules”

  1. Very fishy. It sure sounds like he is the one tweeting. This one is strange:

    neeljani neel jani
    Really worked my kneck out on Sunday with over 400km’s testing in Red Bull Racing’s RBR7 F1 car! What a machine it is!!

    400km all straight line and somehow really worked his neck out. Hmmmmmm. Just read they said it might have been constant radius, guess that explains the neck. 400km seems an awful lot.

    1. Nobody accused them and they denied. Everyone accuses Ferrari and they don’t deny.

      1. comment of the week! at least for me!

        1. Maybe Ferrari don’t deny because they actually tested new parts. But why sould Red Bull deny before anything has been said against them?

          1. To complete the analogy, … because they know they did do something wrong?

            I guess the difference is mainly that no one would have noticed if not for those tweets.

            Ferrari are an easy target, with their own testing circuit constantly observed by people longing to see a Ferrari driving there.

    2. Well that explains it, he was testing the RBR7, not the RB7.

  2. Wish I could afford a go :(

  3. Wouldnt call it a constant radius

    http://wikimapia.org/4298/Idiada-Test-Circuit

    1. Hmm….Yeah, it seems like athlete track or sort of NASCAR oval track. I don’t know what the rule exactly it is though.

    2. If they had done it on the oval then that would be constant radius turns and straight lines.

      1. Should it be just one of them(constant radius and straight)? I don’t know. I think the most important term is “FIA-approved”. if Idiada test circuit is FIA-approved one, why they deny? anyway I don’t know whether the circuit is the one or not.

      2. Oh I see. the circuit has many kind of corner inside of oval. If they used one of them for cornering test, it should be breaking rule. I wonder why FIA didn’t observe the test. did they?

    3. Please not Red Bull, you should have used only the corners or only the straights, not made it easier and just did the oval all day!

    4. Hewis Lamilton
      18th May 2011, 22:48

      The article indicates that it is BELIEVED to have taken place there. It doesn’t say 100% for sure.

      1. Yeah, well …

        But this is a FIA approved circuit close to Barcelona. Sure, Red Bull did not want to confirm anything apart from not breaking the testing rules.

  4. What is this?

    1. What is what?

      1. I mean what the hell is this denial or controversy(could we call it controversy?).

  5. Does sound very dodgy!

    1. Bless. Red Bull have clearly decided that the way to get ahead is to mimic Ferrari. ;)

      1. If they mimic Ferrari, they run the risk of having the 3rd or 4th fastest car on the grid…

  6. With the new EBD rules it’s not the fast corners Red Bull have to worry about ;)

  7. What’s updating by a third party having to do with the issue at hand?
    Or do they use standard templates like: inexperienced F1 driver test – complain about neck. Or, Having a clumsy moment in a bar – this is a private matter etc. etc.

    1. Maybe someone not knowing that what they did is illegal so it should not be tweeted about?

      They will say its about using the wrong words to describe separate straight line test and consant radius corner tests I guess.

  8. I don’t see a denial. Who is accusing?

  9. Red Bull already have the edge over the field ‘high speed cornering’, doubt they would focus to much on that. If they were perhaps testing KERS reliability with over a whopping 400km of testing (mmmmm???) thats the worst case scenario. Anyways these limited tests are surely watched very closely by FIA officials. Just seems like a loose twitter comment by the guy which has put the Red Bull PR department in overdrive trying to play it down, funny no?

    1. Interesting take on the matter. I’ve looked at the rules and nothing says about how long (or short, rather) the tests may be. Very clever if so!

  10. And that was the story of Jani’s final & last time in a RB car…

    (don’t you love that the tweet was deleted?)

  11. Toby Bushby
    19th May 2011, 1:37

    I smell a big can of Bull.

    pobtoon, if Red Bull were testing new parts, they’d need to do high speed cornering tests to make sure they don’t lose downforce in this regard with the updates.

    1. High speed ovals like Idiada are designed so the corners are essentially not corners, so it would not be a good venue if you were wanting to do high speed corner testing.

  12. RT @ANewey Yo @MWhitmarsh – RB’s Wings passed test Again Ha! #CaughtFail @NJani What would @DTrump say? #FF @TFernandes

  13. If that’s the case weren’t there any FIA people present at the time of testing to see whether the testing is taking place under the rules?

    1. Rodger Chen
      19th May 2011, 6:12

      Ofcourse there was.
      fills column space during the break though.

      1. Why would there be FA people present?

        Aero tests are not even considered a “test” as such.

        1. Rodger Chen
          20th May 2011, 4:43

          So that teams don’t just say they are doing an aero test and then belt around corners and such on the day.

          You think the FIA just takes their word for it?

  14. Virgin also did aero testing at Idiada. Nobody is questioning what they did there …

    1. But no team member of theirs put out a tweet saying they did both straight line runs AND high speed cornering on a day totalling 400 km.

      1. But the FIA allows for cornering, prodived it’s on a constant-radius corner. If Red Bull got permission for it, their critics don’t have a leg to stand on.

        I’m willing to bet the accusations have more to do with the act that Red Bull are light years ahead of everyone else.

        1. Williams4Ever
          19th May 2011, 13:30

          Only site that picked up the story was F1F and now most others are referring to this site as source.
          Way to go. Life time all access pass on its way…

        2. But then Red Bull denies he did high speed cornering. So which is it?

  15. Sounds to me like their driver made a silly tweet on his account and RBR are just clarifying before anyone accuses them and it all gets out of hand.

    1. Just like Horner defending that Vettel wasn’t at fault in Turkey 2010 and then Helmut Marko states that it was Webber’s falut because didn’t understand his instructions to let Vettel past. Or that Webber isn’t a 2nd driver at all (even when he said a week and months before that they were building the team around Vettel).

      The clumsy way they try to deny things only makes things worse on themselves.

  16. Hm, that’s interesting. So, any team can do whatever they wish, and than just deny it, and we are suppose to believe everything they say ? BTW, how is this in-season testing governed?

    1. It don’t think there is much governance at all. There is a whole list of rules that tests need to adhere to, but aero tests are a specific exception to these rules.

      All that is said about them in the regulations is:

      four one day aerodynamic tests carried out on FIA approved straight line or constant radius sites between 1 January 2010 and the end of the last Event of the Championship. Any of these days may be substituted for four hours of wind-on full scale wind tunnel testing to be carried out in a single twenty four hour period.

      1. This explains perfectly why RedBull are against the re-introduction of in-season tesing – because they are already doing it!

        Rules that can not be proven or governed apprepriately such as team orders and in-season testing… should be removed.

  17. “We did not complete high speed cornering and tested within the permitted regulations – which is an aero test carried out on FIA approved straight line or constant radius sites.”

    A constant radius site? A constant radius can indeed be a high speed corner. Besides, who cares if it is a high speec dorner or not. If the track or “site” has radial displacement, it is nothing short of a corner or a bend.

    This all sounds a bit fishy.

    Easy answer. Summon this Jani person and investigate

  18. His twitter account is updated by his cousin. It was a huge mistake to write what he did but did not have bad intentions.

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