Indian Grand Prix preview: Can the Red Bulls be beaten in the race?

Can anybody stop Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull from running away to their fourth win in a row?

At first sight, taking the performance advantage Red Bull have had in the last few races into account, the answer is NO. But one point that provides a glimmer of hope is the race pace of McLaren and Ferrari who start right behind the two RB8s.

The Buddh International Circuit is quite dirty off the racing line so the guys in the even numbered-starting positions such as Webber, Button, Massa might have difficulty in defending against the guys starting diagonally behind them thus handing Hamilton and Alonso the opportunity to see if they can do something about Vettel going into Turn 1. If Vettel remains in the lead into Turn 1, barring any technical snags or big blunders, it’s difficult to see how anybody can stop him from getting his fourth win in a row.

Another factor which must be taken into consideration is the tyre wear. So far this weekend, the tyres have lasted much longer than expected and so some teams might try a one-stop which gives Red Bull the advantage as lesser number of pitstops means lesser chances for other teams to try the undercut, provided the Milton-Keynes outfit themselves don’t mess-up their pitstops. One interesting thing to note in Korea was how worried Red Bull were about Vettel’s front right towards the end of the race which might have been due to the team running front camber to the absolute limit. While we can expect Red Bull to do the same here, the less degradation of the tyres means other teams will have to be disappointed as a similar situation at the end of the race combined with the high lateral loadings at the fast corners of the circuit would have provided a chance to hone in on Vettel.

There are two DRS zones on the circuit and the one on the 1.2km-straight has been extended by 80 metres. So even if Vettel remains at the front and either McLaren and Ferrari remain in close proximity, DRS would be of great help to them as Red Bull’s DDRS would not be helpful with DRS not permitted to be used while at the front, especially after seeing that Red Bull are around 10km/hr down on their two main rivals’ top speeds.

Taking all of these into account, now the answer doesn’t become that easy but the fact remains that the RB8 is the fastest car on the grid and it will be a big ask for either of McLaren or Ferrari to overhaul the rampaging Bulls.