“We have not been the quickest car” - Max Verstappen states Red Bull needs to catch up with F1 rivals after the last few races

Max Verstappen believes the Hungarian GP will prove how close Red Bull is to their rivals such as McLaren, Mercedes, and Ferrari. Speaking to the media including Sportskeeda at the Hungaroring circuit, the Dutchman stressed about the drop in performance of the RB20 compared to their rivals in the last three races.

Red Bull and Verstappen have managed to clinch victories in seven races so far. In the last five race weekends, they have been on the back foot in terms of car performance and got outperformed by rivals such as McLaren and Mercedes. The only reason they were able to retain their lead was their rivals biting into each other's points share and McLaren losing three important victories out of the five races.

Looking ahead at the Hungarian GP weekend, Verstappen felt it would be an important weekend that determines where Red Bull is in terms of competitiveness against their rivals. The Milton Keynes squad has brought a big upgrade to their car featuring a new engine cover, halo, front wing, front corner, and rear corner. Their last floor upgrade had not paid the dividends as hoped for and the Dutchman reckoned this upgrade was a bigger one. Mercedes had brought a front wing which led to a significant turnaround in performance, rather than the various floors they had tried out.

Asked how close he expected the competition to be, going into the double-header ahead of the summer break, Verstappen said:

“I think you turn it around, how close can we be to the competition. I think the last few races we have not been the quickest car. I don’t expect that suddenly now it will be any different. Of course we’ll bring upgrades, so hopefully that will give a good boost. But at the moment, yeah just want to try (upgrade) and see how it will work this weekend.”

Asked if the upgrades are going to work or could turn out like the ones in the past which did not add much more performance to the car, he said:

“We brought stuff, but they were not particularly big I would say. But this one is a bit bigger than probably what we used to, what we have brought already. So for everyone this is an important weekend.”

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Max Verstappen deems Hungarian GP weekend crucial for Red Bull's performance going forward

Max Verstappen believes that if the upgrades brought by Red Bull are not enough, it will be tough moving ahead in the next few races. He felt that the Hungarian GP weekend was a crucial one for the entire team to be able to move ahead more smoothly. However, despite the heavy upgrades brought by Red Bull, they might not have a fair idea of what their rivals bring.

There has been speculation that the RB20 could have peaked in terms of development and has plateaued in performance, allowing their rivals to catch up. Christian Horner has admitted in the past that the grid has been converging given the stable regulations, leaving little room for improvement. Their last few upgrades have focused on smoothing out some of their weaknesses.

Asked if the Hungarian GP is going to be a crucial weekend, Verstappen said:

“You could say that, I think so. If this is not giving us some good lap time then I don’t know how rest of the season will evolve. But at the same time I also don’t know what is coming from the other teams right. So we just focus on ourselves, we are bringing quite some things to the car and of course I hope that will give us a bit of lap time.”

Asked if he’s worried that the upgrades won’t work, he said:

“I mean it is always with an upgrade if it doesn’t work, it isn’t good right. Because you work on it and expect it to deliver on track.”

In the Constructors' standings, Red Bull is leading Ferrari with a margin of 71 points with 12 races left on the calendar. Max Verstappen leads Lando Norris by 84 points. But the margin is not significant given the number of races left on the calendar. The concern remains that Red Bull has had lesser wind tunnel time which means there is a limit to the upgrades they can bring, compared to their rivals who have had more wind tunnel time to carry out CFD testing.

As things stand, with Mercedes close on the heels of McLaren and Ferrari slowing down has helped Red Bull retain their lead. However, it will be important for the reigning champions to maximize both races in the double-header, to go into the summer break with a strong lead.