Christian Horner has scoffed at the rumour Red Bull forgot to bring a low-downforce rear wing to Las Vegas, joking these things “can happen” before insisting that is not what happened.

From packing the wrong wing to forgetting to pack a low-downforce one, Red Bull’s rear wing was the subject of varying rumours after a disappointing Thursday night in Sin City.

Did Red Bull forget to pack the low-downforce rear wing?

Max Verstappen was only 17th fastest in second practice, a full two seconds down on pace-setter Lewis Hamilton and 1.998s slower than his title rival Lando Norris, who he needs to outscore by three points to wrap up the championship this weekend.

Red Bull lost a lot of that time on the straights where they were north of half a second off the pace.

Red Bull motorsport advisor Helmut Marko revealed the RB20 was not sporting the right wing for the circuit.

“We don’t have another rear wing, a smaller rear wing, as we see it on our competitors,” he told Autosport. “It would be more helpful, for sure.”

Asked if Red Bull could fly one to the circuit ahead of Friday’s qualifying, he replied: “No.”

But while that led to headlines about the ‘wrong’ wing and even Red Bull forgetting to bring the right one, Horner says that’s not what happened – it’s more that Red Bull don’t have an ultra low-downforce wing to use.

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Asked about the rear wing rumour, Horner clarified Sky F1 meant the one claiming Red Bull “forget it”, the team boss said: “Well you know it can happen… No, we did not forget a rear wing.”

Pressed on what the issue is then with the wing, he insisted: “There’s no issue with it, I don’t know quite where it came from.

“But we don’t have a specifically designed wing for very low downforce, which is basically potentially here and Monza. I mean the money that is involved in creating that within the cost cap you’ve got to pick and choose where you’re going to spend it.

“So the wing that we have, you end up trimming the wings to achieve a top speed and that’s what many, many of the teams have done.”

Showing better top speed in Friday’s final practice where Verstappen was fifth fastest, Horner admitted: “We’re okay. You’re running different engine modes and the whole world looks a lot different.

“So yes, we did not forget our rear wing.”

Verstappen goes into Saturday night’s 50-lap race with a 62-point lead over Norris in the Drivers’ Championship while Red Bull are third in the Constructors’, 49 points down on McLaren.

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