Max Verstappen has made his feelings clear about Red Bull’s performance, insisting that battles with sister team Racing Bulls ‘shouldn’t be happening’. Last weekend, the four-time world champion was left scrapping with rookie Isack Hadjar for a podium spot at the Dutch Grand Prix. Heading into this weekend’s race in Monza, Red Bull are a long way off the pace relative to rivals McLaren, Ferrari and Mercedes.
The gap to the third-placed Silver Arrows in the Constructors’ Championship stands at 34 points, and Verstappen has accumulated all but nine of the Milton Keynes squad’s 205-point tally. In Zandvoort last time out, Verstappen was unable to stretch out an advantage of more than two seconds over Racing Bulls prodigy Hadjar, and while the reigning champion crossed the line in second place, the absence of a pace advantage over the VCARB 02 serves as a warning sign to team principal Laurent Mekies.
Speaking ahead of the Italian Grand Prix, Verstappen told Viaplay: “Of course, happy to be on the podium, but in terms of speed, it wasn’t good. I think it was purely down to qualifying that I was third in the race, because in terms of speed it really wasn’t there.”
He added: “The whole race, we were basically fighting with our sister team based on pure pace. That shouldn’t be happening. That’s just not good. But in a way, we know that those problems are there in our car.”
Delving into the issues present with the RB21, Verstappen highlighted the team’s inability to extract pace from the hard compound tyre during races. “Absolutely no mechanical grip,” he explained.
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“But everyone else can drive on that tyre, except us. So that also means that something is just wrong. That’s why I used the soft and medium, those tyres give a bit more mechanical grip in slow corners, where we were struggling a lot.
“The car is just not fast enough. I also had to save a lot in those fast corners. While everyone goes through Turns Seven and Eight much faster, I have no grip. That’s obviously not good. Of course, in qualifying it was better over one lap, but this season the car is just not good in the race.”
While Verstappen is concerned with the performance of his machinery, Hadjar and Racing Bulls are riding the crest of a wave. The Faenza-based squad rocketed up to seventh place in the Constructors’ Championship standings off the back of the rookie’s maiden podium, and they are only two points behind sixth-placed Aston Martin.