Max Verstappen making “more mistakes” now Red Bull out of “comfort zone”
Is Max Verstappen making more mistakes now he's been put under more pressure?
Ferrari boss Frederic Vasseur believes Max Verstappen is now making “more mistakes” because Red Bull are now longer in a “comfort zone”.
Verstappen has been beaten to the win in two of the last three races, by Lando Norris in Miami and Charles Leclerc more recently in Monaco
It required a masterclass from Verstappen at Imola to beat the McLarens to pole before defeating Norris by just 0.7s on race day.
As a result, Verstappen’s been forced into a number of errors due to the tricky balance of the RB20.
In Monaco, he brushed the wall in Q1, leaving him sixth on the grid.
Vasseur believes the fact that Verstappen and Red Bull are in a less dominant position, the reigning world champion has been forced to “pushed more” and thus is making more mistakes than previously.
“I don't want to draw any conclusions from this weekend, but if you look at the last two weekends, Max made more mistakes in Imola than in the last three seasons," Vasseur told media including Crash.net
“As soon as you have to push more, if you have to stay in your comfort zone for the strategy, for everything, you don't have to make mistakes, and I think they were in that situation - but I'm not drawing any conclusions. They will be back soon and be strong and I am not considering that all the races will be easy until the end.
“As soon as you are in a position where you have to pay more attention to detail, you have a kind of snowball effect - and this is part of the improvement of the last six or seven months.”
After Leclerc’s win in Monaco, he sits just 31 points behind Verstappen in the drivers’ championship.
It’s similarly close in the constructors, with Ferrari just 24 points off.
Ferrari haven’t won the drivers’ crown since 2007 with Kimi Raikkonen - a remarkable 17 years ago.
When assessing Ferrari’s title chances, Vasseur added: "It is not a matter of motivation because the motivation has been there for a while, but it is the self-confidence for the team and drivers.
"We have to continue like this, but the worst-case scenario will be to imagine that it is done and will be like this until the end [of the season] because I'm convinced we will have different tracks with different layouts, different characteristics fitting McLaren more or Red Bull.
"It will be up and down until the end of the season and we have to score points when we are not at the top and be able to win when we are there."
With a sharp eye for F1’s controversies and storylines, Connor is the heartbeat of our unbiased reporting.
