Strong car key to keeping Verstappen at Red Bull - Mekies

Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies says the best way to keep Max Verstappen from leaving is to deliver him with a more competitive car.

Verstappen is believed to have clauses in his contract that would allow him to move elsewhere at the end of the season should he not be within the top championship positions at the summer break. Red Bull, in its first season as a power unit manufacturer, it is currently the fourth-fastest team on average and Verstappen sits seventh in the standings, leading to speculation the four-time world champion could consider a switch.

“Max has made clear to us that he wants to continue with the team,” Mekies said. “It’s equally clear that he needs a fast car for him to be happy with the team. You may recall also that he has been vocal about the progress that we needed to have on the regulations.

“We are in the fortunate situation for the sport where there have been very open discussions between the FIA, F1 and the teams, and we have managed to tweak these regulations for 2027 and 2028. And I think it’s great not only for Max, it’s great for the fast drivers and it’s great for the sport.

“So, as I said a few weeks ago, we are not asking Max every week [if he’s going to stay]. He’s pushing with us, he’s helping us to find the right development path for the car, again this morning doing very large test scans through the sessions to try to turn all the stones possible. So, it’s not a topic for us.

“The topic for us is get the car back to where we want it to be. And as you may, I hope, agree, if the car is back where we want it to be, there will be no discussion.”

With Red Bull potentially hamstrung by a lack of upgrade opportunities having been adjudged to have the strongest internal combustion engine (ICE) by the FIA, Mekies still believes it can get closer to Mercedes after introducing a major aerodynamic development in Austria"

“We started very far away," he said. "We have done that step in Miami, four races ago, that left us around a four-to-five-tenths threshold, which on some tracks allows us to fight for podiums, on some tracks does not allow us to fight for podiums. Now, regardless of Max, that’s not what we are here to do. So, we completely know that we need more steps.

“This weekend is quite a crucial step to try to get much closer and to try to fight for bigger positions. It doesn’t mean that everything will be resolved this weekend. It means that we will need a bit of time to get that package to work. It’s very large.

“Whether that is influencing timing of discussions with Max, honestly, no. Max knows very well how much time a Formula 1 team needs to absorb one second of deficit to competition.

“We hope we can get out of this weekend and be within the last two or three tenths from competition, which I think in the number of races is remarkable progression, and that’s what matters at that moment, that we are able to close that gap continuously. And I’m sure that’s the most important factor for all of us.”