Well, that’s not very satisfying.
We just had days of Red Bull mangling nearly every page of PR 101 as it first blamed Mark Webber for the crash in Turkey, then laid the blame on both him and Sebastian Vettel, then let loose with apologies to its fans and then — in my view — tossed Webber back under the bus by saying he’d called to the paddock to ask for Vettel to slow down.
It’s been quite a show.
And, for the final curtain, the team gives us this?
An amused Vettel and Webber giving the “%^^t happens” shrug? What, not even a tip of the cap to Vettel’s “he’s crazy” gesture when he got out of his wrecked car?
Oh, sure, it’s great that they could force the two into the same room. (It doesn’t look Photoshopped, anyway.) But this doesn’t convince me that all is well in Red Bull land.
What would? Well, how about any of the following:
1. Christian Horner, Helmut Marko and Vettel all on their knees before Webber, clearly pleading for forgiveness.
2. Webber pouring a barrel full of ice cold Red Bull onto Christian Horner.
3. Dietrich Mateschitz handing Webber a big handful of bills.
4. For those of you who think Vettel was the wronged party, I’ll toss in one of Vettel pouring out the barrel of Red Bull onto Horner.
What I’m getting at is, I’m not so sure that the important “mend” needs to be between the two drivers. After all, we all know they don’t like each other to begin with; yeah, this mess has made that worse, but so what if the hatred is now at an 8 instead of a 5 (on the classic 1 to 10 scale).
Rather, I’d like to know that Webber and the team bosses — you know, the ones who at first made it clear they were behind Vettel — are all hunky-dory. Or, if not, I’d like to know that Webber knows that. (And I’d love to know where he’s driving next season.)
But a cheap marketing trick, especially one that isn’t that creative, isn’t going to convince that things are fine. We still will need to see just how professional all these people will be come race weekend. (Not to mention how professional they are now, working toward race weekend.)
* For Noddy. Sorry my first post after a day of my Internet’s being down was negative. I really love Austin, though! Swear!
