They reckon their new fuel is worth 0.15s per lap around Spa-Francorchamps, the venue for this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix.

It’s common that fuel suppliers will introduce a new fuel ahead of a season and then roll out upgrades throughout the season. Red Bull received their first in-season boost in Hungary, with the new fuel set to be fully utilised on the high-speed Spa circuit, where 70% of the lap is spent at full throttle.

“On this track, we feel our new Esso Synergy race fuel worth is about 0.15s per lap,” ExxonMobil Global Motorsport Technology Manager David Tsurusaki told Formula1.com. “In the world of adding a new fuel, that’s significant.

“The other area we focus on for fuel is the energy content of the fuel and how much you can push the engine settings and how far you can get it without getting high pressure knock. We think our fuel is yet to be pushed at the maximum limits, but we don’t get to set that.”

To quantify that fuel gain, it would have been worth a grid slot at Spa last year when Max Verstappen missed out on fourth in qualifying by just 0.11s to Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen.