Webber says his British GP victory did not influence his decision to stay with Red Bull

Talks were already well underway before the British Grand Prix according to the Australian, despite he and his team suggesting otherwise at Silverstone.

Red Bull team boss Christian Horner insisted that discussions over a new deal with Webber would wait until the summer break, but just two days later the squad announced that it was retaining the British GP winner for 2013.

Webber said that hinting talks were on hold had been a deliberate tactic to diffuse speculation. The Australian had also been in discussions with Ferrari before committing to a seventh season at Red Bull.

"I'm not going to tell you guys if I'm doing [the deal] in two days am I?" Webber said in a press conference at Hockenheim.

"We get ready to announce it when we are ready to announce it. We need to keep the situation calm. The tactic worked OK.

"We needed to deal with this stuff in lots of different situations and many different aspects. This was one of them in a contractual sense.

"It was pretty straightforward really. Stay at Red Bull, [or] move on."

Webber is currently championship leader Fernando Alonso's closest rival, and said he had been keen for his future plans not to interfere with the title battle.

"This year is obviously going pretty well and there's a reason to keep the focus on that as well so the continuation of that moving into next year is helpful," he said.

Red Bull has become the pacesetter in recent races, with Sebastian Vettel dominating in Valencia before an alternator problem, and Webber than overcoming Alonso's Ferrari to triumph at Silverstone.

The team pushed to get a substantial upgrade package ready for Valencia, and Webber said the timing had made a big difference, allowing Red Bull to fully get to grips with its updates before the challenge of a more traditional venue like Silverstone.

"They were two different venues with two different temperatures, so it was important for us to get those parts to the track in Valencia to validate a few things and give us a direction," he said.

"It's always nice if you get them earlier than a race later because you learn so much earlier. Ultimately, it was a very good decision. It was very, very difficult to get the equipment to the track and Valencia was the first step to understand some new stuff with the RB8."