{"id":807033,"date":"2026-07-17T23:06:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T23:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/807033\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T23:06:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T23:06:13","slug":"f1-news-unique-way-racing-bulls-decided-who-got-spa-upgrade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/807033\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 news: Unique way Racing Bulls decided who got Spa upgrade"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Unique
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAlan Perman admitted a qualifying battle in Silverstone decided which Racing Bulls driver got the latest upgrade. Image: XPB Images<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The team arrived at Spa-Francorchamps with several new components but was unable to complete the necessary chassis modification on both cars in the short turnaround following the British Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

That left team principal Alan Permane facing the decision of whether Lawson or Lindblad would receive the update in Belgium, with the other car scheduled to be modified ahead of the following round in Hungary.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not so easy and honestly, we don\u2019t like bringing updates for just one car,\u201d Permane said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was impossible for us to do it to two cars. It\u2019s a chassis modification \u2013 we had to shrink the roll hoop and we just couldn\u2019t do that in time between Silverstone and here on both cars.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rather than simply selecting one driver, Racing Bulls allowed Lawson and Lindblad to compete for the upgrade during qualifying at Silverstone.<\/p>\n

Permane first raised the situation with the pair during the Austrian Grand Prix weekend, shortly after Racing Bulls had enjoyed a strong qualifying performance.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhat I did is I sat down with both drivers in Austria on Saturday evening,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d had a very good Qualifying and I thought while everyone\u2019s in a good mood, I\u2019ll give some bad news \u2013 we\u2019ve got a good update coming but we can only do one car for Spa, and the next car will be done for the race after in Budapest.<\/p>\n

\u201cI first suggested the very simple option, which is fair \u2013 we upgrade no cars for Spa, and then both of them for Budapest.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course, they looked at me like I was crazy, and I wouldn\u2019t have ever done that. We didn\u2019t really seriously consider that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe next thing I said is we can flip a coin, or make it a little bit of fun and say whoever qualifies in front in Silverstone gets the upgrade, and they both signed up for that and that\u2019s what we did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Racing Bulls drivers reached the final phase of qualifying at the British Grand Prix, leaving the contest to be decided by just one position.<\/p>\n

Lindblad continued to improve during Q3 and secured ninth on the grid, while Lawson was unable to better his final lap and qualified 10th.<\/p>\n

That result earned Lindblad the updated car for Spa, with the rookie running the revised cooling package while Lawson remained with the previous specification.<\/p>\n

The wider upgrade also includes changes to the rear wing and front brake drum as Racing Bulls looks to build on the improvement delivered by its redesigned floor in Canada.<\/p>\n

Since introducing that package in Montreal, the team has emerged as a consistent presence near the front of the midfield and arrived in Belgium on a run of four consecutive double points finishes.<\/p>\n

While Lindblad won the qualifying contest on this occasion, Permane confirmed Lawson would receive priority should Racing Bulls encounter the same situation again later in the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think what we\u2019ll do if it happens again later in the season, and it may happen \u2013 we\u2019ve got another big thing coming at some point \u2013 it\u2019ll go to Liam, so we won\u2019t do that again,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019ll automatically get it next time. We tried to put a bit of fun into it rather than just allocating it to someone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lawson upbeat as Racing Bulls starts strongly at Spa<\/a><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alan Perman admitted a qualifying battle in Silverstone decided which Racing Bulls driver got the latest upgrade. Image:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":807034,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[14757,14212,64,63,814,817,813,816,3352,9107,6490,85],"class_list":["post-807033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-alan-permane","tag-arvid-lindblad","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-belgian-gp","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-liam-lawson","tag-racing-bulls","tag-slot3","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/807033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=807033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/807033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=807033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=807033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=807033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}