Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has joked the team has been "going to church every week to pray" for a swift update from Formula One engine supplier Renault.
The quadruple world champions were tipped to challenge Mercedes for the F1 title this year following an overhaul to the sport's aerodynamic regulations for 2017, but it is Ferrari who has emerged as Mercedes' closest rivals, with the two teams battling it out for race wins during the early stages of the season.
Red Bull had been as much as 1.8s off the pace in Australia but has made significant progress since, closing the deficit to 0.6s with its revised chassis upgrade in Barcelona. Horner says the team is pinning its hopes of catching Mercedes and Ferrari on Renault's latest engine update -- originally expected for the Canadian Grand Prix -- which could be delayed until the Azerbaijan Grand Prix at the end of June.
"We are going to church every week to pray that it will happen as soon as possible," Horner quipped in an interview with the official Formula One website. "It seems to be work in progress. They said it will be the third engine and it depends on the introduction of that engine. Sure, we are keen to have it as soon as possible. We hope it will be Montreal."
Red Bull currently occupies third place in the constructors' world championship standings and has recorded two podium finishes in China and Spain. Horner admits the team is currently "a bit in no-man's land" having been lagging behind Ferrari and Mercedes but clear of the rest of the field in the timesheets.
"We are a bit in no-man's land," he said. "We are trying to start playing with the big boys! And if we are going to manage that, probably one of our drivers could dictate what happens in the drivers' championship. Because if you have five or six drivers fighting for a win on a Grand Prix weekend, that becomes a somewhat different dynamic.
"We have demonstrated also last season that we can at least play phoenix! Exactly one year ago we had the same amount of points when we arrived in Barcelona and we managed to catch and beat Ferrari. Nobody would have expected that at the very beginning of 2016. So things can change quickly. And one of the key factors for us going strong last year was the engine upgrade in Monaco."