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Red Bull unveils car for 2014 season

Red Bull unveiled the car it hopes Sebastian Vettel will steer to a fifth consecutive Formula One world championship on Tuesday, but chief designer Adrian Newey said a major switch to six-cylinder engines means “all bets are off”.

Four-time defending world champion Vettel and new teammate Daniel Ricciardo pulled the tarp off the RB10 on Tuesday at the Jerez circuit, just before the start of preseason testing on Tuesday. They then posed for photos with Newey and team boss Christian Horner.

F1 tweaks the rules governing the engineering of cars each season, but this year’s changes have required a major change in design. That has led to speculation Red Bull may have trouble to extend its four-year dominance of the competition, which last year saw Vettel match Michael Schumacher’s record of 13 wins in one season as he cruised to the title. Red Bull said its new car was “our first interpretation of F1’s radical new technical regulations” and that it “has little in common with its predecessors”.

Newey agreed that the new rulebook may give Ferrari, Mercedes and Lotus a better chance at finally ending Red Bull’s reign. “I can’t see there are any favorites,” said Newey, who is widely recognized as F1’s leading designer. “It’s so new and open. All bets are off.”

“I guess with our performance of last year we could have been happier if the regulations hadn’t changed,” said Newey, who said the main pressure falls on Red Bull’s engine manufacturer, Renault, as well as competitors Ferrari and Mercedes, to revamp the engines.
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