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Max Verstappen starts the final stretch of the 6 GPs remaining in this year’s Formula 1 much more optimistic than the races of the summer season. The Dutchman explained what went wrong this year and Red Bull Racing lost their stride, and why he believes they are now on course for a fourth consecutive world championship.
After Max Verstappen’s “walks” in the first GPs of this season’s Formula 1, it would sound incredible that after his victory in the Spanish GP in June until this October he would not be able to win again.
“At first it surprised me too”said the Dutchman, “but if you look at exactly what our problems were, then I completely understand what has happened. At one point we took the wrong direction.
The other teams either haven’t reached that particular point yet, or they’ve developed their car in a slightly different way. This is always difficult to determine.
I realized very early on that the feel (of the RB20) was very different to last year’s car, in terms of balance. At that time our car remained much faster than the others, or rather, the others weren’t that good back then.
So, in that period we could compensate for our difficulties. In the matches after that it got worse and worse. At one point our car was very difficult to drive, and at the same time the others were making real progress.”explained the champion, speaking to the English magazine Autosport.
Max Verstappen in the cockpit of the Red Bull RB20 at the 2024 Singapore GP
AP PHOTO/VINCENT THIAN
This difficult point came after the Spanish GP, where Verstappen celebrated his 7th victory in 10 GPs to that point. A few weeks earlier, McLaren had presented the impressive upgrade of the MCL38 in Miami, which quickly turned the Woking car into the flagship of F1.
In a season where most teams – apart from McLaren – found that many car upgrades they made in the factories and in the wind tunnel did not perform as well on the track, Verstappen did not want to focus on RBR’s antiquated wind tunnel at Milton Keynes.
He specifically said: “It’s true that our wind tunnel is a little outdated, but so far this year it’s been doing everything right. Some things are hard to understand. It is something that we can see in the other teams as well, with the exception of McLaren.
All teams had their own problems, including those with a modern wind tunnel. I think it’s extremely difficult to set everything up perfectly, or to get the exact data. This may be due to many factors of the wind tunnel itself, or the correlation of its data with those of the track.”
RBR, however, began to find efficient solutions after the Italian GP – the team’s worst race of the year – thanks to the new RB20 floor it introduced in Azerbaijan. The improvement in performance was such that Max took second place in Singapore.
“Yes, it made me feel better”the Dutchman explained. “This was already a good step for us. I do believe we are heading in the right direction now. It will take some time. You can’t change everything in a week or two. But I think the team was satisfied with what they saw in Baku, too. I think so (that the worst is behind us), to be honest. I hope we will continue to make good progress from now on.”
With these steps forward Max Verstappen hopes to reach his 4th consecutive Formula 1 championship by December, ahead of McLaren’s Lando Norris who has now closed on him on 52 points.
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