Cool Bahrain GP temperatures could have caused Kvyat's F1 woes

The Russian was the first driver eliminated in Q2 last Saturday, finishing the session a second slower than Red Bull team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, later suggesting he lacked trust in his car.

It compounded a miserable start to the season for Kvyat, who failed to make it out of Q1 in Australia and did not make the start there because of an electrical failure.

When asked if the team has an inkling as to why Kvyat is struggling, Red Bull boss Horner said: "We don't have anything we can clearly identify now.

"He was very happy with the car in the heat of the afternoon in Bahrain and as the temperature dropped, perhaps they didn't move enough with the conditions.

"We know how sensitive these tyres can be and that is probably what found him out of the window that he wanted to be in."

Kvyat recovered from 15th to rescue points with seventh while Ricciardo finished an impressive fourth, albeit it a minute down on race winner Nico Rosberg.

"Both drivers did a great job with using the car's potential," said Horner.

"Kvyat started that bit further down on the medium tyre and he used it to good effect.

"We had good degradation again, like in Melbourne, and with good strategy he was able to make some real progress through the race.

"There was some strong overtaking, the same with Daniel Ricciardo. We set out for a two-stop and converted to a three. It worked well for us."

Horner said there was a small improvement with the TAG-Heuer badged Renault engine but highlighted the strong performance of the chassis.

"The power unit certainly has improved a bit," he said. "We have a very stable car on the brakes.

"We were able to run less downforce than most of the other teams.

"Most are running a monkey seat which indicates they are running a higher level of downforce.

"We had a good balance, we were able to trim out the wing and had a good race pace so a solid performance."