Max Verstappen’s surprising verdict on Red Bull changes despite Azerbaijan setup error

While Max Verstappen might have had a miserable race in Azerbaijan, the Dutch driver was feeling quite optimistic after finishing fifth.

While the battle for the race win in Baku was fought between McLaren, Ferrari, and Red Bull, Max Verstappen was not the one fighting for victory as the Dutch driver had a strangely subdued race in Azerbaijan.

Max Verstappen bemoans setup change misstep

Just like last season, Verstappen played second fiddle to Sergio Perez in Azerbaijan as the Mexican driver proved quicker on the streets of Baku.

However, while last year’s RB19 was superior to the point of this still resulting in a Red Bull 1-2, this year saw Perez battle with McLaren’s Oscar Piastri and the Ferrari drivers over the podium places, while Verstappen came home a distant fifth.

He’d lost buckets of time through the middle phase of the race as he got stuck behind the one-stopping Alex Albon and Lando Norris, with his complaints about the car’s braking and ride seemingly continuing the pattern of uncompetitiveness that he’s been locked in at recent races.

But, having come home in fifth place and losing three points to Lando Norris in the Drivers’ Championship, Verstappen was surprisingly upbeat as he spoke about his day.

Given that Perez was able to join in the fight for the win, Verstappen pointed to a last-minute setup change he’d made to his car as being to blame for his lack of competitiveness – rather than it being the car’s recent balance issues.

“I think we just paid the price with the change that we made into qualifying that made it just really difficult to drive,” the championship leader explained.

“The car was jumping around a lot. The wheels were coming off the ground in the low-speed corners, so you don’t have a contact patch with the tarmac and it’s very difficult.

“We tried to make it better, but we made it worse.”

Asked how much influence he’d had on making that setup change, Verstappen confirmed the call had been made with his input – the move proving to backfire as the changes took the car further away from the better handling he’d had on Friday.

“Yeah, our side. I mean, you know, you win and lose as a team,” he said. “We thought it would be a good direction to go into and, in the end, it wasn’t.”

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Having started the race from sixth place on the grid, with championship rival Lando Norris in 16th, Verstappen refused to be browbeaten by the fact the McLaren driver came home ahead of him to close in on him in the championship.

“It is [a wasted opportunity], but you can also turn it around and say they could have done a better job as well, right?” he said.

“So it is what it is. I think we learned a lot – the car did feel a bit better than what we had before, but, with the setup, we maybe went the wrong way and we’ll try to do better.

“If you look at my race, probably everything just was the worst-case scenario, my general balance that I had and then being stuck behind Alex and Lando. So yeah, then, of course, it’s not a surprise at all.”

Red Bull rolled out in Azerbaijan with a floor body update to the RB20, a “subtle” geometry tweak aimed at rectifying some of the balance issues that have become so prevalent through the middle portion of the season.

With Verstappen pointing to his setup choices rather than the car’s inherent behavious as being behind his result in Azerbaijan, the Dutch driver was positive as he spoke about how his team has responded to the critical position it was in after Monza’s drubbing.

“I think it was a good step, yeah,” he said.

“The overall behavior is better. Unfortunately, we just made a few wrong decisions going into qualifying that we paid the price on.”

While Red Bull now trails McLaren by 20 points in the Constructors’ Championship with seven rounds to go, Verstappen’s lead over Norris remains at 59 points as the British driver struggles to close down the gap in any significant way.

With the window of opportunity steadily closing for Norris, Verstappen hinted that his rival will need to dig deep to make it happen should Verstappen be able to eke the most out of his improved package.

“I think if we do a better job ourselves, they need to have a perfect end to the year,” he summed up.

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