Red Bull: we can beat Ferrari in 2006

On the back of an encouraging first season under Red Bull's management, along with improvement to the team's technical staff, sporting director Christian Horner and technical director Mark Smith are both upbeat about their chances for 2006.

"Ferrari have to be our benchmark next year," Horner told this week's Autosport magazine. "If they are better than us then we are not doing a good enough job or Bridgestone are doing a better job than Michelin."

Smith, who was chief designer at Renault until the end of 2004, said: "We can beat Ferrari. The strength of the engineering group that we have at Red Bull is very high. It's the strongest group I've ever worked in."

Red Bull Racing finished in seventh place on the 2005 Constructors' Championship standings, with 34 points. Ferrari, on the other hand, finished third with 100 points.

However, Red Bull Racing believe their chances of beating Ferrari next season will be boosted by the arrival of former McLaren technical director Adrian Newey in February.

Although he will not be able to have much input into the RBR2 prior to the start of the season, it is hoped that he will play a major role in helping the outfit move towards the front of the grid over the course of the year.

Smith explained: "There will be very little that he can do in terms of the first race, but in terms of how we develop the car, he can have a considerable amount of input.

"He's aware of how we work. I really believe he will bring us things that we will benefit from and likewise I think he will be quite pleasantly surprised by the strength of our engineering group.

"In the first month or two we will find our feet, but I can only see positives from his arrival."