Just as Red Bull’s rivals appeared to be closing in on F1’s benchmark squad, Max Verstappen and team-mate Sergio Perez were gifted a step forward in pace with an overhaul of their RB19 for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

The winning margins since the update landed have been above 30 seconds over the nearest non-Red Bull car, putting it back on a par with where it started the season.

The changes to the sidepods and floor were teed up as being mainly for reliability and cooling reasons, but rivals have no doubts that it has helped make the car quicker.

And that has left squads like Mercedes facing up to the reality that it needs to dig even deeper with its own car designs if it is to have any hope of fighting for wins on pure pace.

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said that the current dominatio

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