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To take it back to Kravitz's comments about the upgraded floor and wing being the reason for Red Bull's improvements (over Singapore), it is not as simple as dismissing him as being wrong, because there is some truth in what he said.
The reality is that it is much more complicated than just a ride height issue, and also more complicated than just a floor and wing development. But TK is in the unenviable position of having to explain things to an audience that may not comprehend the nuances of F1 technology but will also be criticised by some for 'dumbing down' what he says.
The issue stems back to Red Bull's issues at Singapore, which were more than just a matter of having to raise the ride height. That was a contributing factor, but not the cause of the decline in performance (compared to the field).
It is true that the RB19 can run lower than its rivals at almost every track. Which means going into Singapore, Red Bull would have been forced to make a larger ride height change than most. This meant the car ended further away from its sweet spot by default.
But the story does not start and end with ride height. Having to make a change to the ride height does not automatically prevent a good car from performing strongly, but a circuit that forces more compromises also creates more possibility for things to go wrong and that is what happened at Red Bull.
The issues started in the simulator. Horner: 'our simulation before the weekend didn’t lead us to the right conclusion, and then you have to unravel your way out of that. We were just not in the right operating window for the car, particularly over a single lap. When you are not there, the tyres feel horrible, everything just doesn’t work.'
When you look across the whole weekend, Red Bull moved closer to their sweet spot for the circuit, but admit themselves they sometimes got that wrong too.
Monaghan: 'We’ve made some mistakes [...] some errors we made along the way. We had some problems Friday morning, had a different set of problems Friday afternoon. It looked like we were making some progress on Saturday afternoon in FP3, and then we overshot a little bit for qualifying. I think we compounded some errors'
Then you throw in the floor. This was an upgrade the team brought to the track at Singapore, but they had to eliminate as a cause of the issues and so reverted to the previous iteration. Monaghan: 'It casts all sort of doubts and questions in your mind. We weren’t on it and as settled as we have enjoyed at the majority of the races up to this one, so of course we question ourselves.'
Roll on to Japan. The team can bring the car back to its 'normal' ride height, but they also reintroduced the new floor. The FP1 session allowed them to compare old vs new, and the results show the new floor as being an improvement. With the improved floor giving much more vertical load to the car, Red Bull were able to run a wing that had medium downforce. This surprised many in the pitlane, as Red Bull have previously ran high in terms of downforce compared to the field. The single DRS zone was also a factor here, meaning the DRS effect was minimised.
So, when TK told the viewers that the new floor and wing setup was why they performed so well, he was partly right (to an extent).
The Red Bull ride height was low, bringing the car back closer to the sweet spot. The new floor improved the vertical load, allowing a less draggy wing to be applied.
The ride height, new floor and wing setup were all reasons why Red Bull were back at the front.
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