Adrian Newey: staying ahead of the pack

The Red Bull-Renault technical director, talks to Simon Arron about the championship fight.

The Red Bull-Renault technical director, talks about the championship fight. How do you see the development race between yourselves, McLaren and Ferrari? It's impossible to forecast. We are now more than 18 months into a very new set of regulations. There were obviously some significant changes last winter, with regard to the refuelling ban and smaller front tyres, but the aerodynamic regulations have been more or less fixed. On that basis it is likely that the rate will gradually slow down.

As long as your rivals try and copy things on your car they are not trying new things. What other areas can you explore before they get there? If I told you that they'd be doing it! McLaren pioneered the F-duct this year, but I find it very difficult to forecast what new features will come along, as opposed to incremental development of wings or whatever.

Is it reassuring to see your main rivals trying things already fitted to your car? Only if we stay ahead. You can look at it two ways. It's complimentary, but not necessarily reassuring because if they do a decent job our advantage might be eroded. How do you rate your two drivers Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel? Mark is very sensitive in some areas, Sebastian in others. That gives us two things to look at, but their driving technique is sufficiently similar that it doesn't give us the headache of having to develop the car differently for the two of them.