Max Verstappen names most worrying thing about Red Bull’s ‘awful’ car | F1 | Sport
Max Verstappen moaned that his Red Bull car is “all over the place” and “incredibly tough to drive” at the end of a gruelling Saturday. The four-time world champion is not used to scrapping for small points but that is his reality right now with Red Bull quite comfortably the slowest of the four top Formula 1 teams.
Verstappen and team-mate Isack Hadjar didn’t score a point between them in the Sprint, having had their chances scuppered on the opening lap. Verstappen suffered a terrible launch and dropped as low as 20th before clawing his way back to ninth place, while Hadjar was slammed into by Kimi Antonelli at the first corner and, while he could continue, the damage took its toll and he limped to 15th.
Things didn’t get any better in qualifying as both Red Bulls made it to Q3 but were slower than Pierre Gasly, Verstappen’s former team-mate now representing Alpine who finished dead last in the constructors’ standings last year. Alpine have undoubtedly made significant progress, but it’s also true that Verstappen feels far from him in his RB22 right now.
“We’re where we are, P7 or P8, fighting with Pierre,” he shrugged. ” It’s incredibly tough to drive – there’s no balance, I cannot lean on the car. Every lap is a fight. It’s just very difficult. Every time I did another lap on a new tyre set it felt awful.”
That was even after Red Bull took his car apart in the garage to rebuild it after the Sprint race, in the hope that a fresh setup would make things easier. But it didn’t, Verstappen adding: “It was the same – we turned it upside down and it was exactly the same. I’m expecting exactly the same [in the Grand Prix] tomorrow.”
That is perhaps the part that worries the Dutchman the most – even last year, Red Bull would frequently find things tough on a Friday or even a Saturday, but would figure out a solution in time for qualifying and the race to at least put their star man in the fight. But that’s not happening for them anymore.
Verstappen said: “That’s not good, that’s not a nice thing. Sometimes, in the past, we’ve turned it upside down and it would work. But now, nothing works. I cannot push and every lap is survival for me. I’m not enjoying it at all.
“It’s just very inconsistent. I cannot build a reference through qualifying so, whatever lap I do… can I go four tenths faster? Maybe. Can I go four tenths slower? There’s a big chance as well, because it’s all over the place. It’s just incredibly difficult.”
