Carlos Sainz claims that the early signs suggest that Red Bull's engine has stolen a march on its rivals.

"It's still extremely early days, but if I would have to judge by the GPS data of yesterday, right now it is true that whatever Red Bull Ford powertrains were doing yesterday was a clear step ahead of anyone else," the Spaniard told reporters in Bahrain, "not only a small step but a clear step, and it was mighty impressive.

"If they manage to turn up to race one with a completely new set of regulations, with a completely new engine, new people, and turn up to be the fastest and most reliable engine, you will have to take your hat off to them and say what they've come up with, because at least what they were showing yesterday was very impressive," he added.

His praise for the Austrian manufacturer's power unit - the first it has produced - follows equally positive comments from Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff on Wednesday, the Austrian claiming that the Red Bull is currently setting the benchmark.

Of course, a sceptic might suggest that Sainz, whose Williams is powered by a Mercedes engine, is echoing Wolff's claims in a bid to turn attention away from the ongoing row over the legality of the Three-Pointed Star's own power unit.

The Spaniard is of the opinion that Red Bull has made a better job of balancing car set-up and battery usage.

"I think the key of these regulations is not going to be separating both, but integrating both of them together, he said. "And so far from what I could see yesterday, it seems like Red Bull have done exactly that, without having to give the driver a compromise

"When the car is telling you to downshift a certain way, you just do what the car is asking you to do. That's why all drivers, after we will end up doing maybe 300, 400 laps in Bahrain, we try to sort every kind of technique to try and help the driveability and the performance of the car.

"That's why I'm insisting that the integration of power unit versus gearbox versus driver preferences, it all has to be a closed circle. The moment one of the two or three things are not exactly how you want is where you start facing issues, so everyone's going to need to adapt and find the right way.

"If I have to look ahead from two or three years from now, I think it's going to be integrating the two, and not having to give the choice to the driver, or having to tell the driver to adapt, and integrating both in the same package. That's what we ended up doing with the previous set of regulations."