Red Bull Racing saw themselves slip further behind the Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team in the Constructors’ championship, after coming so close to overtaking them in the standings. Max Verstappen finished second and Sergio Pérez crossed the line in fourth at Brazil.
Team Principal Christian Horner believes the Sao Paulo Grand Prix was damage limitation for the team, after Lewis Hamilton won the race with Valtteri Bottas rounding off the podium. It brought an end to Red Bull’s run of double podium finishes and saw the gap between themselves and Mercedes grow, whereas Verstappen saw his lead shrink to fourteen points.
Both Red Bull’s fought valiantly to keep Hamilton behind, with Verstappen even appearing to run the world champion off the track, both though eventually fell to the speed with which Hamilton carried all weekend in Brazil. Pérez was unfortunate to slip off the podium after being caught out by a VSC, allowing Bottas a cheap pit-stop ahead to jump the Mexican driver.
With three races to go it is still all to play for but Horner does believe that his team have some catching up to do.
“To come away with second and fourth today, plus the fastest lap was damage limitation this weekend. We scored 20 points for Max this weekend versus their 25 for Lewis in the Drivers’ Championship, so we’ll take that. We put up as good a defence as we could, Max did his best and raced hard, and Checo made Lewis have two goes to get past, and he came back with a great move to reclaim the place after Lewis’ first effort.
“But we saw Mercedes pace from Friday and then again yesterday, so today wasn’t too much of a surprise. They did a good job and Lewis drove a great race today, so well done to them. We’ve got some catching up to do this week. There’s a lot of racing still to go, so we’ll brush ourselves down and come back fighting in Doha.”
