Why Red Bull's latest flexi-wing claims are just a dead cat

It is a hypothetical situation, but imagine you are walking down the F1 paddock and see a huge group of people standing outside the FIA. 

Christian Horner is there, holding court along with Red Bull's technical lead Pierre Wache, but they appear to be holding something up, showing it off to a puzzled posse of journalists.

The assembled pack of scribes are all trying to ask a variant of: 'Why hasn't the RB21 made a big step forward, are you having problems with the new car?'

'Look here,' comes the reply. 

"Here is a dead cat I've just found in the paddock. No-one knows how it died, but isn't it strange that a dead cat should turn up in the F1 paddock?'

Now, fortunately, Tiddles is alive and well, and Horner and Wache have not gone around holding a dead cat up, but Wache has come pretty close.

He has claimed that flexi-wing tricks are "still going on", adding that "Ferrari and McLaren are doing the mini-DRS stuff still."

This stems back to 2024, when the FIA investigated McLaren's rear-wing design for flexing in the Azerbaijan GP as Oscar Piastri won. 

The wing flexed in such a manner as to create a 'second DRS', dumping the drag even when the DRS is not available. Now, it is an established fact of physics that a downforce-producing wing will flex under load. That's as basic a fact as the Earth orbiting the Sun, only racing in the vacuum of space would prevent that.

But anyway, stricter tests are coming in for the Spanish GP which the FIA hopes will nip flexi-wings in the bud, for a couple of years at least before it rears its head again.

For Red Bull in 2025, it provides a useful distraction tactic after the troubled launch of the RB21. The immediate impression of the new machine, when it broke cover, was: 'Is that it?' as it looked remarkably similar to the flawed RB20. 

Red Bull insisted that major changes had been made under the bodywork, but the car was fourth fastest at best over testing behind McLaren, Ferrari, and Mercedes, with it also completing the fewest laps of any team at just 304.

Max Verstappen did find enough pace after a hodge-job of set-ups, wing combinations and floors were tried to go second-fastest on the final day, but it was a struggle to find a good operating window, with both he and Liam Lawson also losing time through mechanical issues.

For now, trying to direct the media's attention over there, to our dead cat (read flexi-wings) whilst saying: 'Nothing to see here, guv' might work, but if Red Bull starts the season where it appears to be after testing, the dead cat might not be a big enough distraction.