Verstappen puzzled by ‘weird’ Red Bull concern

Max Verstappen has stated Red Bull's high tyre degradation at the Dutch Grand Prix was a “weird” issue for the team to endure.

Red Bull has traditionally been quite strong with its tyre management and it was one of its strongest traits that delivered it championship success across the last handful of seasons.

However, it has been caught by rival F1 teams of late, and in particular McLaren, who won the Dutch Grand Prix on Sunday.

Lando Norris connivingly beat Verstappen at the Circuit Zandvoort, overtaking the world champion before building up a lead of 22 seconds at the chequered flag.

Verstappen was struggling with his car throughout the race, stating the woes he endured during Friday practice were not eradicated.

“The whole weekend has been the same,” Verstappen told media including RacingNews365. 

“I mean, I had pretty much the same balance from FP1 all the way to the race. I mean, the limitations are the same. It's just very hard to solve at the moment. 

“It just seems like we are too slow, but also quite bad on deg at the moment. That's a bit weird because I think the last few years normally we've been quite good on that. 

“So something has been going wrong lately with the car that we need to understand and we need to, of course, quickly try to improve.”

'Nothing' Verstappen could do to fend off Norris

Verstappen took the lead of the race on the opening lap after getting a better launch than Norris off the line from second place.

The Dutchman was unable to build a gap to Norris before he was overtaken on lap 18.

Verstappen conceded he was unable to fight with Norris as he struggled to extract pace from his RB20.

“I was just doing my own race, looking after the tyres, I tried to do the best I could,” he stated. 

“But yeah, at one point, nothing was turning or responding anymore. So then Lando got quite close the first time, like he said, he was close, but not close enough. 

“Then the next lap, there was nothing that I could do. So once he passed, I just focused on doing my race, tried to bring it to the end in second.”