Max Verstappen and Helmut Marko attributed Red Bull’s dominant victory at the Italian Grand Prix to a change in the car’s setup approach, under the direction of new boss Laurent Mekies. Verstappen secured pole position and then took the victory at Monza with ease, surpassing the usually unreachable McLarens by almost 20 seconds, the widest victory margin of the season. This triumph represented Red Bull’s first victory without Christian Horner at the helm of the team, who was replaced by former engineer Mekies at the end of July. This result, along with Verstappen’s podium finish at the Dutch Grand Prix a week earlier, marked a significant shift in the team’s performance after the summer break. Verstappen has expressed his opinion on the instability of the Red Bull car in the last 18 months. The four-time world champion noted that the team is approaching each weekend with a clearer focus to extract maximum performance from the car.
Verstappen went on to explain that the extreme changes in the car’s setup demonstrated a lack of control and total understanding. With Mekies, who has experience in engineering, appropriate questions are being asked of the engineers, which, according to Verstappen, is working very well. In addition, the team is using the experience gained to define a direction, which has yielded good results. Verstappen felt that he had already taken an important step in Zandvoort that worked well, and here another step that seemed even better. Although fundamental changes in Formula 1 cars rarely happen overnight, and improvements are always in progress, any new part on the Red Bull car would now be part of a process initiated under Horner’s supervision.So far, we’ve had many races where we’ve been testing different car setups.
Max Verstappen
Verstappen’s victory was the third of the season and the first since the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix in May. Although initially considered a contender for the title, he is now out of the fight. He is currently in third place, 96 points behind the championship leader, Oscar Piastri.Basically, it’s the same product as before, only with some improvements that are working. But 20 seconds over McLaren, I wouldn’t have predicted that.
Helmut Marko
