Verstappen Shares Worries About Red Bull's Pace: 'I Have Been Concerned For A While'
F1Tuesday, 25 June 2024 at 22:00
Max Verstappen expressed concerns about Red Bull's pace following the tight victory at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in the tenth round of the 2024 season.
Many experts predicted the Red Bull Racing F1 team would return to its form at the beginning of the season and dominate again at the Spanish Grand Prix.
However, that wasn't the case at all. Sergio Perez, who started from P11, only finished in P8, and Verstappen, who was beaten by Lando Norris in qualifying, managed to get the victory, but he clearly wasn't the fastest.
Speaking to the media after the race, the 26-year-old Red Bull driver himself stated that he pushed everything out of his car, but he still wasn't as fast as Norris.
"Lando and McLaren were very quick today, especially on the degradation. Every time I wanted to push, the tires overheated."
What helped the Dutchman was how fast he got into the lead at the start of the race, while the McLaren driver lost too much time fighting for positions.
"We won, but we were not the quickest. That is a shame. I am happy with the win, but we cannot keep this up the whole season. On pure pace, we were too slow. We did everything well. We had an aggressive strategy, and it paid out."
As it stands, Verstappen comfortably leads the Championship by 69 points ahead of Norris. However, there are 14 race weekends left in the 2024 season, and everything can change rather quickly.
Since the Miami Grand Prix- in the last five race weekends, Red Bull wasn't faster than the Papaya team at any circuit. Asked whether he was concerned about Red Bull's lack of pace, the triple World Champion said:
"I have been concerned for a while. We want to be the fastest, and we are not currently. We obviously need to work hard to improve. We need to make our car better and see how we can improve the tire management."
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