‘One problem if not several’ – Helmut Marko’s Red Bull reveal as path to title set out

Conceding Red Bull have more than one problem, Helmut Marko reckons achieving the double won’t be easy but the math is actually straight forward.

Although last year’s championship was an all-Verstappen affair for Red Bull with Max Verstappen’s 575 points putting Red Bull 166 points up on Red Bull in the teams’ standings, this year the competition has closed in.

Helmut Marko: It won’t be easy…

The second fastest team in the early rounds, Ferrari made it a two-car tussle against Verstappen before McLaren joined in. More recently Mercedes won two grands prix.

Last year Red Bull won all but one Grand Prix, 19 of those going the way of Verstappen, with Ferrari the only team aside from Red Bull to stand on the top step of the podium.

This season is shaping up to be a very different year with Red Bull, all in the hands of Verstappen, winning ‘just’ seven of 12 races.

With the Dutchman’s P1s no longer enough to guarantee championship success, Red Bull are having to count their points.

So much so that ever since Sergio Perez’s last podium, a P3 at the Chinese Grand Prix, Red Bull have scored 178 points to stay P1 in the Constructors’ Championship with Ferrari netting just 151 points.

But with McLaren scoring 199, Red Bull face a challenge from the Woking team, as well as Mercedes who bagged 169 points since China but 52 in the last two races alone.

Marko accepts that while on the track it won’t be easy retain the Constructors’ title, mathematically the equation is.

“It won’t be that easy,” he told OE24 . “We didn’t have the fastest car in Silverstone. We have one problem, if not several.

“But as long as we extend our lead in every race, it’ll be fine.”

With 373 to Ferrari’s 302 it is a mathematical equation that has worked for Red Bull even on Perez’s worst days.

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One that has Verstappen worried about what comes next given since China he has scored 145 points and Perez just 60.

“Max wants to win,” said Marko, “of course, and that’s understandable. Although races like this are not bad for the sporting image of Formula 1.”

The race ‘not like this’ that the Austrian referred to was the British Grand Prix which was won by Lewis Hamilton, who crossed the line less than two seconds ahead of Verstappen.

“Otherwise it would actually be boring,” admits Marko.

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