Verstappen confident of Red Bull attack with race pace

Max Verstappen has faith in Red Bull’s race pace compared to its qualifying efforts after Friday practice ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix and is already aiming to attack despite the fallout of the start of the Bahrain race.

Last time out Verstappen attacked from his lowly starting position of 15^th after a crash in qualifying but suffered a puncture in a collision while attempting to overtake Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton on the opening lap.

The damage to his Red Bull’s differential sustained during his limp back to the pits with his puncture ultimately forced Verstappen into retirement in Bahrain, while the pair traded criticisms after the race before burying the tensions with a public handshake yesterday in China.

Verstappen ended Friday practice at the Shanghai International Circuit down in fifth place over 0.3s off of timesheet-topper Hamilton but says he has confidence in Red Bull’s race pace to set-up a three-team fight for victory in China.

“The pace was good, especially on the long runs,  was happy with that and the car was behaving quite well there,” Verstappen said. “Short runs I think we can still improve a little bit but no big problems so that’s good.

“The tyres were still not totally ready but also it was a similar story to Bahrain. So I changed the mapping and in second practice it was good.

“We have to have a really good qualifying but in general even when that doesn’t happen I think in the race we will be competitive and on this track you can overtake.”

Verstappen has also moved to end his feud with Hamilton after their handshake and agreement yesterday as he focuses on the upcoming F1 race in China.

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore because it happened, we are in China and it’s a new race,” he said.

12 months ago Verstappen produced a huge charge up the field in the wet in China by rising to reach the podium in third place having started in a lowly 16^th place.