Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has explained what caused both Red Bull cars to retire during the closing stages of the Bahrain Grand Prix. Max Verstappen suffered a failure that saw him slowly lose power before trundling to a near-halt out on track, whilst teammate Sergio Perez experienced a more instantaneous failure on the final lap of the race. The team moved to deny rumours about the issue potentially being that there was not enough fuel on board, and the official statement from the outfit was that the problems were linked to the fuel pumps within their power units. These are standardised parts across the entire grid, and are manufactured by Italian company Marelli. Now Marko has given further details about the nature of the issue.
Marko says "fuel supply system" was behind problems
"To put it simply. A vacuum in the fuel supply system caused the engine to run out of fuel," Marko told German outlet F1-Insider . "I think we can solve the problem already in Saudi Arabia this weekend." Marko has further denied speculation about the cars not having enough fuel to get to the end of the race, adding: "Without giving exact figures: There was still enough petrol in the tank of both cars." Despite the team's difficult end to the Bahrain Grand Prix, Marko is confident that Red Bull can bounce back at the next race on the calendar in Saudi Arabia. "Basically we were fast enough [in Bahrain]," the Austrian explained. "We were just not able to use our potential at the decisive moment. In Saudi Arabia we will be back at full speed and fight for victory."
Verstappen backs Red Bull to return to form
Marko is not the only one feeling optimistic about Red Bull's prospects in Jeddah, with Verstappen having voiced his hopes that the squad will "come back stronger". "Last weekend was a tough one for all of us to take, we win and lose as a team and we’ll come back stronger this week," the World Champion said in a team preview of the upcoming race. "We have a good package and we were competitive in Bahrain, so there are positives to take from the weekend, and we have a very long season ahead – it's only the first race."
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