Marko knows: "No more excuses" for Red Bull in 2020 title race

With Aston Martin Red Bull Racing now having a powerful and reliable engine in the back of their car, the team's advisor Dr Helmut Marko knows there are "no more excuses" for the team in 2020 not to challenge for the championship.

In years past, Red Bull's progress was mostly halted by their Renault power units, which lacked in both reliability and performance. The team switched to Honda as engine partners in 2019, a decision that has already proven to be the right one.

The Bulls had just one mechanical retirement across all of 2019 (Pierre Gasly in Baku) while Honda also made big gains as the year progressed. By the end of the season, Honda's power unit was very close if not better than Mercedes'.

With a powerful engine in the back of their car for the full season in 2020, Marko realises this should be the year where Red Bull start properly fighting for the title again.

"We want to fight for the championship and to do so we know that we have to be competitive with the chassis right from the start – and that means the very first race," the Austrian told Motorsport.com.

Red Bull typically start the year off behind their competitors and close the gap as the season progresses, and 2019 was no exception as the team's first win didn't come until the Austrian Grand Prix, when several upgrades had been introduced to the RB15.

If the Milton Keynes-based team wants to challenge for the title, however, they have to be in the mix from the very first Grand Prix in Melbourne.

"Honda has good increases for this year," the 76-year-old continued. 

"And since everything has been fulfilled so far, we assume that this will happen.

"That means we have no more excuses, in plain English. I think it will have to be more than five [wins to challenge for the title]."