06/09/2025 07:10
Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has spied an opportunity for Max
Verstappen after showing signs of a clear improvement from the
team's woe of 12 months ago. Verstappen departed Monza last year by
describing his RB20 as "an undriveable monster", and fearing for
his hopes of landing a fourth F1 drivers' title in the face of the
challenge from McLaren's Lando Norris. One year on, and while only
Friday practice, Marko saw enough in Verstappen's all-round
performance to indicate his driver will at least be in the mix, and
that perhaps McLaren will not have it all their own way, as they
did in Zandvoort last weekend. Verstappen finished sixth quickest,
two-tenths of a second behind pacesetter Norris, and 0.018s behind
championship leader Oscar Piastri, whilst on the long runs, the
RB21 showed strong pace. "We are very satisfied," Marko told Sky DE
. "In contrast to last year, there is a clear improvement. The long
run was very good, but on the softs we still need to improve a bit
for qualifying. "However, the gap is not drastic. If McLaren
doesn't put sand in our eyes, it could be very exciting." There
were moments of angst throughout the two Friday sessions for
Verstappen, airing his woes in inimitable style over the radio to
engineer Gianpiero Lambiase. As Marko pointed out, though, "we
tried things and went to the limit." He added: "That means we can
test the limit faster and in terms of direction [of the setup]
we're not as far off as sometimes in the past." As is often the
way, Marko indicated it is "about getting the tyre in the right
working window." Rather than scrabbling around trying to find what
can often be a needle in a haystack, Marko found cause for
optimism. "We think we know where we need to intervene," he said.
"And a deficit of just under two tenths is encouraging."
