{"id":3332,"date":"2010-03-16T07:37:17","date_gmt":"2010-03-16T11:37:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/?p=3332"},"modified":"2010-03-17T22:20:48","modified_gmt":"2010-03-18T02:20:48","slug":"vettels-spark-plug-puts-spotlight-back-on-renault","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/formula-1\/vettels-spark-plug-puts-spotlight-back-on-renault\/","title":{"rendered":"Vettel’s spark plug puts spotlight back on Renault"},"content":{"rendered":"
Hours after Red Bull diagnosed an exhaust problem as the cause of Sebastian Vettel’s Bahrain power loss, the team issued a media statement.<\/span><\/h5>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 22-year-old race leader, having started from pole, fell behind the eventual podium sitters and finished the season opener just fourth.<\/p>\n

Red Bull said late on Sunday that “further investigations have proven that the loss of power was actually due to a spark plug failure and not the exhaust”.<\/p>\n

The statement reminded observers about Red Bull’s persistent reliability problems with its Renault engines last year, and ultimately futile efforts over the winter to switch to Mercedes.<\/p>\n

“Failed world championship beginning: did Red Bull stumble with Renault?” read a headline in the Swiss newspaper Blick.<\/p>\n

And McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton is quoted as saying by The Sun: “If Vettel had a reliable engine, he’s got so much downforce he could run away with it.<\/p>\n

“But if he has problems it won’t be a runaway year for anyone,” he told the British newspaper.<\/p>\n

Dr Helmut Marko, Red Bull’s motor sport adviser, said Sunday proved the talent of Vettel and the pace of Adrian Newey’s RB6 design.<\/p>\n

“What was shown by Vettel in Bahrain after the big horsepower loss was his incredible speed in the corners,” he said.<\/p>\n

According to Spain’s Diario AS, however, Vettel ran out of fuel after crossing the chequered flag on Sunday.<\/p>\n

But Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso is celebrating cautiously after winning on debut with the famous Italian team.<\/p>\n

“Red Bull are still a bit ahead of us,” he is quoted as saying by Blick from his home in Lugano.<\/p>\n

\u00a9 RIF|GMM<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hours after Red Bull diagnosed an exhaust problem as the cause of Sebastian Vettel’s Bahrain power loss, the team issued a media statement. \u00a0 The 22-year-old race leader, having started from pole, fell behind the eventual podium sitters and finished the season opener just fourth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[3],"tags":[5262,129,164],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3332"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3332"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3400,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3332\/revisions\/3400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}