Red Bull to change Webber's engine

Red Bull Racing has confirmed that it will replace the Renault engine in Mark Webber's car ahead of qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix

By:

Jonathan Noble

Co-author:

Dieter Rencken

Aug 29, 2009, 10:18 AM

The team had fitted a brand new power unit to Webber's RB5 car on Saturday morning, but a problem with it was detected early in the session.

A decision was taken for a fresh Renault to be brought into play for the rest of the weekend, which will be the seventh new engine out of a total of eight that Webber has used this season.

Team principal Christian Horner told AUTOSPORT it was too early to judge whether or not the problem engine this morning had a terminal problem, or if it was something that could be fixed so the unit could be brought back into action later this year.

The incident comes just a week after Sebastian Vettel's title hopes were hurt badly by a double engine failure at the European Grand Prix that has forced him to severely limit his practice mileage in a bid to try and avoid reliability problems later this year.