Championship leader Max Verstappenadmitted he had endured a “difficult” day of practice for the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix.
The Red Bull driver was fifth in the opening practice session and seventh in the second over the first day of running at the Imola circuit.Verstappen complained about the balance of his Red Bull in both sessions, making small mistakes on multiple push laps over the course of the day. He said he was unhappy with his car both on high and low fuel.
“A difficult day,” he told the official F1 channel. “Just difficult to get a good balance.
“Just not really feeling comfortable in the car, moving around a lot. It’s very easy to lose the car. So a few things that we have to look at because today [was] just bad.
“It’s not comfortable. Also, the long run was really bad, so definitely a few things that we have to improve if we want to be competitive tomorrow.”
Verstappen was frustrated by an encounter with Lewis Hamilton when the Mercedes driver slowed at the Villeneuve chicane during the second session. While Verstappen expressed his annoyance at his rival, Hamilton told his race engineer Peter Bonnington he had failed to warn him that Verstappen was approaching.
“It’s just not the first time,” Verstappen explained. “You try to, of course, always stay calm about it, but it happened again.
“But also I don’t want to really talk about it too much because that’s not our issue. Today we were just severely off-pace – that we need to fix.”
Asked if he believes Red Bull can turn their performance around heading into qualifying on Saturday, Verstappen said: “I guess it can’t be worse than what we had today, right?”
“We’ll look at a few things that we can do better for tomorrow, but it looks a bit like the others took a bit of a step forward,” he continued. “And from our side, just a bad day.”
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Jere (@jerejj)
17th May 2024, 17:49
Only practice day, so too early to conclude definitively.
BasCB (@bascb)
17th May 2024, 19:36
Yeah, I am still expecting Verstappen to be more or less OK in Q1, in the top 5 by Q2 and on top of it by Q3
Silent but Deadly
17th May 2024, 18:14
No, that’s impossible, All true fans know that the car has nothing to do with performance. It’s 100% driver skill. Always*.
(*Valid while MV’s winning)
Mayrton
18th May 2024, 8:30
That’s always funny, but on a more serious note there is a difference between pace/stamina/consistency of a driver’s performance during a race (that’s where the Lewis-es and Max-es stand out vs others) and single lap pace on Saturday.
Neil (@neilosjames)
17th May 2024, 18:17
And yet, I’m still expecting him to take pole by a few tenths and win the race by 20 seconds.
schooner (@schooner)
17th May 2024, 18:44
Well, Max was a bit off his game 2 weeks ago in Miami (or probably more accurately, his car was a bit off), and he wound up losing by 7 seconds. If RB don’t get the car sorted to Max’s liking, there appears to be at least some hope for some action up front on Sunday.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
17th May 2024, 19:54
expect more from fp3, probably not a track RB have drilled down.
Edvaldo
17th May 2024, 18:40
He’s already practicing for when he joins Toto Wolff at Mercedes.
“Alpine seems too strong this weekend, they’re a threat.”
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
17th May 2024, 19:05
It’s only practice, but perhaps newey leaving has such an impact that the car gets worse overnight!
Tristan
17th May 2024, 22:48
No question it does considering they kicked him out of all engineering meetings overnight.
NoelyNoel (@noelynoel)
17th May 2024, 19:23
This is the first time in recent memory Mac has been anything other than “happy” with his setup at the end of a Friday. Last time out in Miami may not have been an anomaly; perhaps Red Bull’s upgrades are taking them in the wrong direction, or at least not moving them forwards. The rest of the weekend will tell of course, I wouldn’t put it past either Max or the team to downplay their potential at this point in the season. It’s all good for “the show” after all.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
17th May 2024, 19:52
no more party mode for red bull ?
Tristan
17th May 2024, 22:50
Someone needs to tell F1 that Lidarr exists and would solve all these blocking problems.
How many times have they said this is the teams responsibility yet they simply don’t care enough not to make the mistake again.
The tech is easily there for all drivers to be notified of any car that is approaching on what side without need for a spotter
AlanD
18th May 2024, 3:11
F1 drivers also complain thst the mirrors are too small to see anything and the engineers say they are too big and mess up aero. The other day I was on my local bus and noticed that instead of mirrors, the bus now has cameras and screens in the drivers cab to give him excellent all round views. In F1, they’d probably class that as an illegal driver aid.
Tristan
18th May 2024, 6:10
Yep, even most 10 year old cars have blind spot indicators. Sad F1 is so behind on tech.
S
18th May 2024, 10:04
Why tech?
Stay away from the racing line and drive at a safe speed (relative to everyone else) when not on a push lap. It’s that easy.
Yes, newer trucks and buses have been installing cameras and screens rather than mirrors for a while – not necessarily because they are better to see with (they aren’t) but because they are much smaller and reduce drag, which reduces fuel consumption, which makes the marketing departments and governments happy.
Worth noting, though, that those screens are as good as useless when they are being shaken around a lot and are in direct sunlight. Like they would be if used on an open-wheel racing car, for instance….
As for F1 being behind on tech. Yeah – for good reason.
If you like the ‘sporting’ part of motorsport, then the less tech, the better. If all you want is engineering, you’re looking in the wrong place. F1 is and always will be a heavily restricted series in that aspect simply because tech ruins the on-track product. Traction control and active suspension immediately spring to mind as being things that made cars faster and proportionally less interesting – particularly in a racing situation.
MM
18th May 2024, 2:39
It’s nice to see the competition catching up. We may have a nice battle for the championship by the end of the year.