Max Verstappen was just 12km away from an engine failure which would have ruined his race at the Hungarian Grand Prix, according to Christian Horner.
The Dutchman started from 10th place after having his qualifying ruined by a small issue in his power unit. To give them the best chance of weaving through the pack, Red Bull decided to give him and team-mate Sergio Perez fresh power units.
And it turned out to be an inspired call for more than one reason. No doubt Verstappen benefitted from the extra horsepower, but Horner has revealed that without the new engine the Dutchman would most likely have not even been able to start the race.
That would have left Lewis Hamilton clear to power to his and Mercedes' first victory of the season. But it wasn't to be as Red Bull admit they were "lucky" that the problem was initially identified in qualifying rather than the following day.
"We changed the power unit because there was a part that broke on Max’s car [in qualifying]," team principal Horner told reporters in Budapest.
"Luckily we are here now [as race winners]. With the maximum hindsight it's lucky the part broke yesterday because with 12 kilometres more, it would have broken during the laps to the grid. So we decided to change the whole power unit rather than trying to fix it there. And as a precaution, we also changed Checo's engine."
Horner revealed even more good news for his team as he went on to say that, with a bit of work, both engines taken out of the cars can still be used later in the season.
It means they are less likely to incur a grid penalty, with both drivers now only one new ICE away from exceeding their annual allocation.
Verstappen used his new power unit to win from 10th in one of his most impressive performances of the season so far. Perez also managed to make progress from 11th, but was not as effective as his team-mate and could manage only fifth place.
