Max Verstappen resists, his teammates stumble: the Red Bull Racing team must logically ask itself questions after suffering another failure with Sergio Perez.
Arriving at Red Bull in 2016, Verstappen gradually learned and then overtook Daniel Ricciardo as the team’s star driver, the Australian driver having moved to Renault, while Pierre Gasly, Alex Albon and more recently Sergio Perez have all suffered the law of the Dutch.
To the point that everyone says that Red Bull has developed a car for Verstappen or, in any case, very adapted to the style of the quadruple world champion.
But Pierre Waché, the technical director, is adamant: Red Bull never intentionally designed an F1 car specifically for Max.
“It was not our intention to develop a car specifically for Max, but as a driver he may face a precarious balance, being less ‘connected’ if you will to his F1. To make a fast car, for example definition, you are going in this direction.”
“It’s still possible to create an understeer car, but it would be slower. Our job is to move away from that and use the settings to make it faster. Max is capable of handling that and I think Alex Albon explained it very well recently.”
-Waché highlights Verstappen’s ability to adapt to an unbalanced F1.
“A few years ago, during testing in Budapest, Max’s DRS didn’t close when he hit the brakes. But he didn’t actually leave the track when turning – he just said that it felt like the rear was light.”
“He has an ability to adapt and get the best out of what he has left that we haven’t seen in any of his teammates.”
It remains to be seen whether Liam Lawson, promoted alongside him for 2025, will be able to reverse the trend…
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