Revealed: Reason behind Verstappen manager fury at Red Bull boss

A reason why Max Verstappen's manager gave Helmut Marko "a piece of his mind" has now emerged.

Verstappen trailed home a distant sixth at the end of the Bahrain Grand Prix. It was the culmination of a rough weekend for the four-time F1 champion who, seven days previously, had capped off his astonishing pole position at the Japanese Grand Prix with the 64th F1 win of his career.

Verstappen bemoaned continual brake and balance issues with his RB21 around the Bahrain International Circuit, and during the race was subjected to slow pit stops due to a wiring loom issue with the pit gantry that also affected team-mate Yuki Tsunoda.

Following the race, Sky Sports F1's pit-lane reporter Ted Kravitz spotted Verstappen's manager, Raymond Vermeulen, raging at Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko.

Kravitz said: "At the end of the race, I was waiting around for some team principals, and Raymond Vermeulen, Max's manager, came into the Red Bull garage and gave Helmut Marko what can only be described as a piece of his mind.

"He was then remonstrating with Helmut Marko, and Helmut Marko was just standing taking it. Raymond then stormed off at the back of the garage, taking his pass off as he went. Clearly, they are not happy."

Kravitz has now expanded on what he saw and the reason he feels lay behind such anger from Vermeulen in Marko's direction.

Speaking on the Sky Sports F1 podcast, Kravitz said: "I've seen plenty of times where Raymond Vermeulen or Jos Verstappen and Christian Horner and Helmut Marko have been discussing situations.

"But Raymond seemed particularly irked about something which I think was actually the pit stop problems.

“We’ve got short memories haven’t we? Not two weeks ago, we were saying Max Verstappen is definitely back in the world championship following his fantastic performance in Japan, on pole and winning the grand prix. So let’s be a bit careful with this.

"Red Bull would have known from testing they weren’t as quick as the McLarens and not as quick as Mercedes. There were pretty much no surprises.

"I think what the Verstappens were annoyed about, what Raymond Vermeulen was annoyed about, and Max said this as well, when everything isn’t so great on the car, at least we need to have good pit stops and good operational things going on.”