Helmut Marko explains huge Red Bull concern after Bahrain practice

Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has stated the RB21 car is “too slow” in Bahrain as it struggled with overheating tyres during the opening day of practice.

Max Verstappen ended the second practice session as the fastest Red Bull driver, but could only muster seventh place.

The Dutchman's lap time was eight-tenths of a second down on session leader Oscar Piastri as McLaren set an imposing deficit over the rest of the competition.

Explaining Red Bull's struggles around the Bahrain International Circuit, Marko detailed the team is struggling in the hot conditions.

“We are too slow and the tyres are becoming far too hot,” Marko told media including RacingNews365.

When asked how much of the deficit is down to low engine modes, Marko replied: “Not much.”

Verstappen's long-run pace started off in the range of being competitive with the second McLaren car of Lando Norris.

However, as the tyres got hotter, Verstappen's pace began to suffer as the Pirelli rubber could not be brought back to a normal operating temperature.

“The main problem is the tyre temperature, which we can't keep under control,” Marko said. “And as soon as the temperature goes up, we are sliding.

“Sliding makes it even worse. Strange enough, at one stage the tyre recovered, and we are doing the same lap times like Lando, but that was only three or four laps out of 15.”

As Red Bull enters the Bahrain round off the back of a victory in Japan, Marko is hopeful it can perform successful set-up changes to get it back into a competitive position.

“If we would know [how to fix the issues], we would change it,” Marko said.

“But we will change it like we did in Japan, and hopefully we get this golden mixture of setup changes and we are more competitive tomorrow.”