Formula 1: Did Red Bull Racing have the best chassis in 2018?

While they finished in third place in the 2018 Formula 1 constructor standings behind Mercedes and Ferrari, did Red Bull Racing have the best chassis in 2018?

Aston Martin Red Bull Racing finished in third place in the constructor standings for the second consecutive season in the 2018 Formula 1 season, as they finished behind Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport and Scuderia Ferrari.

Red Bull Racing finished 236 points behind Mercedes (655 to 419) and 152 points behind Ferrari (571 to 419) in the constructor standings with four victories. Mercedes earned 11 victories while Ferrari earned six throughout the 21-race season.

The drivers of the Milton Keynes-based team, Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo, finished in fourth and sixth place in the driver standings with 249 points and 170 points, respectively. They each won two races in the 2018 season.

However, Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner believes that the team had the best chassis among the sport’s 10 teams in the 2018 season, including both Mercedes and Ferrari.

Here is what Horner had to say about the matter, according to Motorsport.com.

"“I think RB14 has been a very strong car. I think arguably it’s been the strongest chassis of the season. If you were to equalise the power between the top three teams I think you’d see that RBR14 has been an extremely good race car.“Look at whenever the power unit hasn’t been a factor, or as predominant a factor – we won in Monaco even with an MGU-K failure, we were second in Singapore, we won in Mexico again when altitude played a key role. Those races we’ve been particularly strong in.“Obviously we tend to run lower downforce levels to try and create the same top speeds, and as soon as you try to trim wing to do that you introduce other compromises into the handling of the car. But when we’ve able to run full spec – we should have had a front row lock-out in Monaco, and we had one in Mexico.”"

Is Horner right?

There is a very good case to be made for Red Bull Racing’s chassis as the best of the 2018 season, and Horner pretty much hit on why.

The Renault engines used by Red Bull Racing were nowhere near as reliable nor as powerful as the Mercedes engines used by Mercedes or the Ferrari engines used by Ferrari. So in the races in which engine power was not the key factor in terms of lap speed in practice and qualifying sessions and competitiveness in the races themselves, Red Bull Racing thrived.

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The most notable races of these races were the races that Horner brought up: the Monaco Grand Prix, the Singapore Grand Prix and the Mexican Grand Prix.

Ricciardo won the Monaco Grand Prix on the tight street circuit in Monte Carlo, Monaco by 7.336 seconds over second place finisher Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari after starting the race from the pole position and leading all 78 of its laps despite the fact that he dealt with an engine issue for the final 60 laps that caused him to be roughly 20 miles per hour slower than his rivals on the straightaways.

Verstappen finished in second place in the Singapore Grand Prix on the tight street circuit in Marina Bay, Singapore after starting the race in second, and he challenged race winner Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport late despite the fact that he ended up finishing 8.961 seconds behind him.

Verstappen won the Mexican Grand Prix by 17.316 seconds over Vettel after starting the race in second place, taking the lead right after the start of it and leading 67 of its 71 laps, as he only gave up the lead during his pit stop.

The high altitude of Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City, Mexico served as somewhat of an equalizer among the engines of Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull Racing in the Mexican Grand Prix, so Verstappen’s pure dominance in the race essentially proved that Red Bull Racing’s chassis is the best chassis in the sport.

In fact, after that race, you could make the case that it really isn’t all that close, either.

Ricciardo, meanwhile, was slated for a podium finish in this race after starting it from the pole position before a late mechanical issue forced him to retire from it.

With Red Bull Racing set to switch from Renault engines to Honda engines for the 2019 season, the fact that their chassis was arguably the best in the sport in the 2018 season could give them an overall advantage over both Mercedes and Ferrari in the 2019 season assuming their new Honda engines are more reliable and more powerful than their Renault engines were. It almost goes without saying that they are expected to be.

Did Red Bull Racing have the best chassis in the 2018 Formula 1 season? If so, will their switch from Renault engines to Honda engines for the 2019 season result in the team contending to win what would be their first constructor championship since they won their fourth consecutive constructor championship in the 2013 season?