Red Bull told to 'grow up' after US GP tape gate "gamesmanship"

Red Bull have been accused of “gamesmanship” after a team member attempted to remove tape guiding McLaren’s Lando Norris to his grid position.

Red Bull were fined €50,000, half of which is suspended, by the FIA stewards after a post-race investigation found that a member of the team had “re-entered the gate well area at Gate 1 in proximity of the second grid position”.

It later emerged that the mechanic had ignored instructions from the marshals and was tampering with the marker McLaren had left Norris on the pit wall after the cars had pulled away for the formation lap.

Max Verstappen would go on to dominate the United States Grand Prix ahead of Norris to cut championship leader Oscar Piastri’s advantage in the title race to 40 points with five weekends remaining.

Former F1 driver Karun Chandhok described Red Bull’s behaviour as “gamesmanship”.

“It’s classic Dick Dastardly stuff. I mean what happens next, do you unplug their wheel gun when they are not looking?” Chandhok joked on the Sky Sports F1 Show.

"It's actually something that's been quite common for many years. I mean, I remember my race engineer, when I first came to the UK in 2002, my race engineer used to do that, put tape on the wall. Ironically he now works for the FIA.

"People have done it for many years; this is not a new trick.”

Red Bull told to 'grow up' 

It is understood that it was not the first instance where Red Bull have attempted to remove tape markers from the pit wall put down by rival teams this season.

“Apparently this has been a bit of a game going on all year. Once Red Bull found out McLaren were doing this, they’ve been taking the tape off at other races,” Chandhok added.

“Then McLaren found a stronger, stickier tape. This is all rumour and conjecture that I’ve heard from other people, so I can’t confirm any of this.

"It's a bit of gamesmanship. When Lando comes [back onto the grid], pulls around and he's looking for that tape. There's a lot going on, on the formation lap. There's a lot going through the driver's mind. Lando was saying himself, his heart rate's up, it's an intense lap.

"And you come there, you're looking for your marker, it's not there. Does it slightly put him off? That's what they're trying to do. It's a bit of gamesmanship, but it's a bit naughty.”

Sky Sports F1 commentator David Croft was unimpressed, telling Red Bull to “grow up”.

"It's like in football, where you give away a foul and then you go and kick the ball away. It's like, just don’t.

“Just grow up! It really annoys me this sort of gamesmanship.”