The tale of Randy Mandy and Luscious Liz

Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel have swapped Bulls

Jul.09 (YallaF1.com) Partner swapping may serve to spice up the relationship of couples whose relationship has gone flat, but when Red Bull Racing’s Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber talk about sharing Randy Mandy and Luscious Liz, and getting back into bed with the partner they started with, well, you have to wonder what they’re talking about.

Sebastian powers to victory driving Luscious Liz

It’s like this: after Webber’s huge accident in Valencia, his chassis – the car in which he won the Spanish and Monaco Grands Prix – had to be semi-retired, to serve as the team’s spare. So this weekend in Silverstone, for the British Grand Prix, he’ll be driving the chassis that Vettel christened ‘Luscious Liz’ at the start of the season and in which he won the Malaysian GP.

So how does Seb, who now drives “Randy Mandy”, feel about this, erm, chassis infidelity? “I’m not sure if Webber names his cars and anyway there’s not exactly rights on names. She had a bit of a crack around the front suspension, which is why I switched to Randy Mandy. But I’m sure Webber and Liz will get along fine.”

Christian Horner flanked by his drivers on the Shanghai podium

Team boss Christian Horner explained the team’s driver-chassis menage-a-trois in somewhat less romantic terms: “At the end of the day a chassis is just a bracket that components are bolted on to. We’re 100 percent sure that both chassis are in equal condition. The repair that we had to make to Seb’s old chassis was a fairly straightforward fix.” For the record, Vettel will race this weekend in chassis two – the car Webber raced himself at the Bahrain GP, while the Aussie takes chassis three. Chassis four, just in case anyone out there is confused, is Webber’s Valencia ride – a car he admitted had “looked after him pretty well”, even if he never felt moved to give it a name.

Sebastian walks the new Silverstone with some of the Red Bull crew

The challenge for drivers, chassis and cars this weekend is to master the new-look Silverstone circuit – the track where the team scored a dominant 1-2 last year. For 2010 there’s a tighter new infield sector, although the high-speed swoops on which RB5 performed so well in 2009 remain. Horner said: “Last year we had no weak sectors, but a lot changes in 12 months and it will be very interesting to see what effect the new layout has on the characteristics of our car.”

Webber reckoned circuit bosses had done “an incredible job” to retain the British GP at Silverstone and was optimistic that the new layout “had kept all the good stuff.”

Vettel, too: “I don’t know who designed Silverstone but he had to be a genius. With the corner speeds and downforce we have now, it’s unbelievable. This is one of those places where you really feel an F1 car. I’m hopeful that it will still suit our car really well, even with the changes.”