When the B team triumphed

So I’m going to tell you a quick story about Formula 1. It’s the story of an underdog team, so stick around, it’s gonna be a nice one.

First a quick history lesson. 

Redbull racing was formed in 2005. The Redbull group bought the company from Ford, who was running it as Jaguar Racing. And that was the birth of Redbull racing. They were sponsoring the Formula 1 team before this though, but just as a sponsor. 

The next year, they decided they needed a B team. A team where they could send their junior drivers to get a hang of the cars and gain race experience. So they went and got another team.
This time it was Minardi, which they rebranded to Scuderia Toro Rosso. Which roughly translates to Redbull.

So Christian Horner was the team principal of red bull racing 

And Franz Tost was the team principal of Scuderia Toro rosso. 

Now fast forward to 2008. 

A young German driver is promoted from the RedBull drivers program. But the team sends him to toro Rosso to gain experience.
The Redbull drivers are David Coulthard, and Mark Webber. 2 fast experienced drivers. And up to this point, neither of the team has won a race. Not Redbull nor toro rosso. But that changed in Italy. The young german driver driving for the Redbull B team, was Sebastian Vettel . he was just 21 years old, and driving a Formula 1 car. Wild. To complicate things further, Toro Roso was using a 2007 spec Ferrari engine, not a new one. 

But none of that mattered. Vettel threw caution in the wind and just drove his heart out. And during qualifying, he claimed pole position. In a toro Rosso, at MONZA. For those of you who don’t know, the Monza circuit is also called ‘The temple of Speed’ because of its lack of corners and abundance of straights. They just go flat out. 

Many people thought that the pole position was pure luck and that he’d lose places on Sunday. 

But when Sunday came, Vettel showed maturity and drove like a champion. He didn’t set a foot wrong and he won the race.
 

The 21-year-old German boy, won a race for the Redbull B team Before the actual Redbull team won a race. 

What’s better is that that year, The B team finished above the main Redbull racing team in the championship. They scored 39 points, while RedBull managed 29 points. 

Vettel himself scored a whopping 34 points. That’s just mental.


Told you it’s a great story.  

And reflecting on his time at Torro Rosso, team boss Franz Tost said
“And in Formula 1, when he came then to us, he brought in fresh blood, new ideas, he was very demanding and asking many questions. He went into detail, which is very important, and he was always in a good mood, although we had at the beginning some problems with the car, he pushed the team forward, and as a result, he won, together with Scuderia Toro Rosso in those days, the race in Monza.”

 

After Toro Rosso Vettel joined Redbull. And in his 3rd race for them, he grabbed pole position and won the race, in china. He won 4 world championships from 2010 to 2013 and he will be retiring at the end of the season, as a legend no doubt.