Max Verstappen reveals ‘big concern’ despite topping practice
Max Verstappen highlights his concerns going into the rest of the Mexico City Grand Prix weekend.
Max Verstappen says he is concerned about his chances of winning the Mexico City Grand Prix despite setting the pace in practice.
The four-time world champion was one of nine drivers to sit out of first practice for rookies, but returned to action in style by topping FP2 by 0.153 seconds ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
But Verstappen, who has made up 64 points on championship leader Oscar Piastri in the past four races, was not completely happy with the performance of his much-improved Red Bull.
The Dutchman was heard complaining over team radio in second practice that he had “no grip”, adding his RB21 felt “like driving on ice” on the medium compound tyre.
Although Verstappen had the edge in the short runs, he is concerned about Red Bull’s lack of competitiveness during the high-fuel running that was conducted later in FP2.
“The short run on the softs we managed to do a good lap, the rest, everything else was pretty bad,” he explained.
“The medium short run was not great and the big problem is the long run where we seem to struggle a lot, so that is of course a big concern for the race.
“The balance wasn’t even off there was just no grip. That is the bigger concern. As soon as you go for a sustainable run the tyres are going hot. We were nowhere, so that’s a tough one to sort out but we’ll see.
“You are not going to win a race like that. You can be fast over one lap but if you have absolutely zero pace in the race then it’s going to be tough.
“I prefer to be fast in the race and not so fast over one lap.”
Verstappen's concerns downplayed
Sky Sports F1 pundit and former Aston Martin strategist Bernie Collins downplayed Verstappen’s worries, pointing to how Red Bull often manage to turn things around come qualifying and the race.
“It would definitely mix things up if we ended up with a grid like that but I think here is quite difficult to overtake - even historically it is one of those tracks where qualifying is quite important,” she said.
“We’ve seen Red Bull time and time again work overnight on a Friday night into Saturday and then the race car does look much stronger by the time we get to Sunday than it has on Friday.”
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