Horner investigation unlikely to be resolved before team’s launch

In brief

Red Bull’s Horner investigation begins

Red Bull is due to launch its new car, the RB20, at its headquarters on Thursday. However it remains to be seen whether it will have decided the future of team principal Christian Horner by then.

The team’s Austrian owners confirmed on Monday it was looking into allegations relating to Horner’s conduct. It began an investigation yesterday which Horner was pictured heading to.

“As already stated, it would not be appropriate for us to comment before the investigation is completed,” a spokesperson for Red Bull Austria told RaceFans.

F3 field almost set as Bedrin takes PHM seat

PHM has become the latest F3 team to complete its line-up for the coming season. It has signed Nikita Bedrin to partner Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak and Joshua Dufek. ART is the only team left with a seat to fill for the new season.

Bedrin said his deal was “very last minute news and very unexpected, so a lot of hard work will have to be done.”

Larson surprised by IndyCar’s similarity to NASCAR

NASCAR Cup champion Kyle Larson said he was surprised by the similarities an IndyCar has to his usual machine after testing in preparation for his Indianapolis 500 debut.

The 2021 cup winner, who will race a fourth McLaren at the Indy 500 this year, said he was “really kind of surprised that it feels a lot like a Next Gen Cup car” after running at Phoenix this week.

“The way that just the grip of the tyre felt when I turned to the wheel to a point, get past the slip of the tyre, the sidewall, I felt like it all felt really similar to the Cup car. You’re just going faster.”

He believes recent changes to NASCAR’s stock car design have narrowed the gap between it and IndyCar racing. “The first change I think they raised the back of the car up, that made me loose in, that would have made me loose in the Cup car. Next they raised the front up to match the rear, that’s when I said I had less grip, I’m pretty sure that’s what that adjustment would have felt like in a Cup car, as well.

“Between the underbody and all that, the mechanics of the car, I feel like our stock cars are much similar. I guess what I’m getting at is that I hope it makes the transition between the two simpler than what it would have been four or five years…