06 March 2023 , 06:00
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Christian Horner wasted little time in having a little dig at Aston Martin after Fernando Alonso joined the two Red Bull drivers on the podium in Bahrain.
Pre-season testing hinted that the Silverstone team would catch the eye this year, and the first race of 2023 proved it. Clearly, the AMR23 had more pace than any other car on the track – apart from the runaway Red Bulls, of course.
"Based on one race, you'd have to say they were the second strongest here," said Horner, after Alonso finished third and Lance Stroll crossed the line sixth. After that, he was keen to remind everyone that the Aston Martin car was chiefly designed by someone with extensive knowledge of Red Bull's title-winning technology.
And so he added: "They've obviously done a good job over the winter. They say imitation is the biggest form of flattery and, you know, it's good to see the old car [referring to Red Bull's RB18 used in the 2022 season] doing so well."
Fallows will, deservedly, take a great deal of the credit for Aston Martin's sudden rise to prominence. It has created a very exciting prospect for F1 fans – for the first time since the Hybrid Era began in 2014, a team not named Red Bull, Ferrari or Mercedes looks set up to regularly compete for podiums, perhaps even a few wins.
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What that means for Red Bull, though, is the emergence of a new threat to their success. And a key event in the build-up to this situation was that move that Fallows made, moving to Aston Martin.
Fallows was a long-serving member of the Red Bull team before his Aston Martin move (Red Bull Content Pool)But it is not something Red Bull are going to regret. Fallows held the title of head of aerodynamics but, with the long-serving Adrian Newey still in his chief technical officer role and the highly-rated Pierre Wache not going anywhere as technical director, it was hard to see how Fallows was going to move up the ladder.
So when Aston Martin came calling, it created a scenario which suited all parties. Fallows earned a more prominent title, Aston Martin gained a very talented aerodynamicist and Red Bull could now allow Wache to truly thrive in his role. The fact they received a handsome fee from Aston Martin to allow him to leave only helped to sweeten the deal.
The biggest winner of all might be Alonso. So many times during his career he has made the wrong decision when joining new teams. But on the admittedly limited amount of available evidence so far, he may actually be able to truly thrive in the twilight of his Formula 1 career.