Red Bull Racing scored another podium this weekend as Max Verstappen took second place at the Portuguese Grand Prix, splitting the Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team drivers.
It was a battling race for both Red Bull Racing drivers. Verstappen capitalised on Lewis Hamilton’s misjudgement at the safety car restart to climb up to second, only for the world champion to take the place back soon after. The Red Bull mechanics did well to almost undercut Valtteri Bottas, who was also overtaken by Hamilton.
As Bottas exited the pit lane he struggled to get heat into his tyres, meaning he was defenceless to the flying Dutchman. This put Verstappen into technically second place, where he stayed for the remainder of the race.
On the other side of the garage Sergio Pérez drove superbly to take fourth place and also driver of the day! The Mexican had an early battle with Lando Norris, before dispatching the Mclaren driver. Pérez managed to take his medium tyres almost to the end of the race, in what was possibly the best performance he has had for Red Bull so far.
Team principal Christian Horner was pleased with both his drivers’ performances and recognises just how close this championship is going to be, as the FIA Formula One World Championship moves on to Barcelona.
“Looking at today we can see that this championship is going to be a marathon and not a sprint. It’s so tight and it’s going to be all about marginal gains. Max drove the wheels off the car again today, snatching second from Mercedes and it’s super tight between him and Lewis.” Said Horner.
“With Max, it was frustrating to lose the point for Fastest Lap at the end of the race due to track limits which I think we agree need to be consistent throughout the race weekend. Horner added. “Similarly with Sergio, he lost out to a case of track limits when he was overtaken by the McLaren but once he got back past, his race pace was good so he is definitely getting there and the races are coming together for him. In clean air his pace was matching that of the leaders so I’m pleased with the progress he is making.”
“On the whole, second and fourth place means plenty of points and there’s only eight separating Max and Lewis in the championship. Barcelona next week will be the benchmark and we’ll get our heads down until then when hopefully we get a clearer picture of the strengths and weaknesses of all the cars.”
