Max Verstappen expressed his dissatisfaction with Red Bull’s performance at the 2024 British Grand Prix, despite managing to secure a second-place finish.
The championship leader finished behind Lewis Hamilton, who won in front of his home crowd. Verstappen overtook Lando Norris late in the race but couldn’t close the gap to Hamilton in the final laps.
Reflecting on the race, Verstappen highlighted the car’s struggles, particularly with tire grip and overall performance. “The beginning was not very good. I tried to keep up, but I just ran out of tires. Everything was running out, and I just struggled for grip,” Verstappen explained to the press at Silverstone, including Total-Motorsport. “Lando got by, then Oscar got by, and then it started to rain. I had no grip there either.”
He added, “I didn’t want to take too much risk because it didn’t feel good or comfortable. I was just trying to survive. At one point, even Carlos [Sainz] joined the battle, so it was a really bad afternoon.”
Despite the challenging conditions, Verstappen credited Red Bull’s strategic decisions for his podium finish. “We made the right calls, from slicks to inters, and back to slicks again, which kept me in contention,” he said. “Choosing the hard tire for the final stint was definitely the right call because we could push on it. The medium tire wasn’t good enough for us.”
Verstappen acknowledged that finishing second on a day when fifth or sixth seemed likely was a positive outcome, though he emphasized the need for improvement. “On a poor afternoon in terms of performance, to finish second… I’ll take that,” he noted.
The Dutchman, accustomed to winning, views anything less than first place as a setback. Red Bull, which has dominated the last two seasons, is now facing increased competition from McLaren and Mercedes. Verstappen suggested the team needs to investigate their recent issues, saying, “I just didn’t have the pace. I couldn’t follow what they were doing in front of me, and that’s something we need to look at.”
