Max Verstappen reveals Red Bull’s big weakness after tough race

Max Verstappen has reeled off a lengthy list of what went wrong for Red Bull in a tough race at the F1 Bahrain Grand Prix.

A week after his stunning, unlikely win in Japan, Verstappen was brought back down to earth across what turned out to be an incredibly challenging weekend in Bahrain for Red Bull.

The four-time world champion was only able to finish sixth in Bahrain thanks to a last-lap overtake on Alpine’s Pierre Gasly.

But Verstappen was left frustrated by several issues, including two slow pit stops.

“The start was not good then the pace was not good in the beginning,” he explained. “Tyres overheating again, the balance was not where I wanted it to be.

“The first pit stop something went wrong with the lights, they stayed on.

“Now you can drive through the lights but that’s not the protocol of the team, so I had to just wait before I realised there was a problem.

“Then I was stuck in traffic, the hard tyres unfortunately didn’t work. They were just low on grip and even higher deg for me.

“Then we pitted again - an even worse pit stop - so then I was last.

“Considering everything to still finish P6, with the pace we had, is still a good result.

“There’s not much more that we could have done.”

Tyre management Red Bull’s Achilles’ Heel

Verstappen pinpointed tyre management as Red Bull’s biggest weakness with their RB21.

“We are bad on tyre management at the moment,” he said.

“The balance is not where I wanted it to be and on a track like this it gets highlighted for sure.”

Asked if next weekend’s race in Jeddah may be better for Red Bull, Verstappen replied: “The tyre degradation will be a bit lower in general but if you are poor on tyres, you are poor everywhere with the management.

“Of course there it is a little bit less but it’s still going to be weaker than our competitors. We just need to take that into consideration.

“At least maybe the layout will help a little bit. But tyre management stays the same. If you are weak on it, you are weak on it everywhere.

“Even if I would have had two mediums, the position would have been the same. I was not at the same level as the cars ahead of me.”