After the drivers took action last weekend on the usual layout of the Bahrain International Circuit, a race will be held this weekend on what is called the ‘outer track’. This version of the track, which consists mainly of long straights and actually has only a few turns, has never been used for a race before.
Asked about his expectations for this race, the penultimate of the 2020 Formula 1 season, he replied Verstappen short: “Little.” To then explain: “We don’t have the top speed, so it ends.” Last Saturday it seemed Red Bull to be able to keep up with Mercedes quite well on the straights. “But then we drove with less wing,” said Verstappen that the good top speed was the result of a compromise in the setup. The profit that Red Bull can achieve this weekend by putting even less wing will therefore be limited, while Mercedes can very likely make a bigger step with the top speed. “It’s just difficult for us,” confirms Verstappen.
Verstappen shared on Sunday immediately after the Bahrain Grand Prix, in which he behind Lewis Hamilton came second, not happy with the strategy his team had come up with. The nine-time Grand Prix winner says that this was immediately discussed during the debrief on Sunday. About how that meeting went, he said: “You listen to each other and you just try to do it better next time.”
Asked what strategic decision he was not exactly happy with, Verstappen replied: “With all the stops. Due to the red flag and the safety car, a three-stopper was actually not that good anymore. We had the tires to be aggressive and we just didn’t, while Mercedes didn’t have the right tires. I was just fed up with that. We should have come in earlier for that first stop in the beginning, so you gain a second and a half or two seconds in a lap, if he’s still running on old tires. But we didn’t. They came in for us and I was just disappointed about that. And if you look back at the race, we should have made that second stop earlier too, if you decided to do three pit stops. So we went on there too long. The fact that it is also a slow pit stop does not help at all. And that third stop, I didn’t quite understand it. I already had the fastest lap. But it is what it is. ”
GPUpdate Podcast: Was Red Bull’s strategy indeed the wrong one?
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