Red Bull has ‘work to do’ after soft tyre struggles in Bahrain

Max Verstappen says Red Bull has a “bit of work to do” after struggling to extract performance from Pirelli’s softest Formula 1 tyre during Bahrain Grand Prix practice. 

The Dutchman ended up eight tenths adrift of the Ferrari duo and over three tenths behind Lewis Hamilton’s third-placed Mercedes in second practice, while Nico Hulkenberg turned in a strong lap to go fifth fastest for Renault and ahead of Verstappen’s lead Red Bull. 

Verstappen admitted Red Bull is heading into Saturday on the back foot having failed to get the most out of the Soft compound tyres in Bahrain, though he remains optimistic about the team’s race pace. 

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“It has been okay but we still have quite a bit of work to do so I am not happy with how the car is behaving,” Verstappen said. 

“We will look into the data tonight to see what we can do. 

“On the medium tyre we were really competitive. I should have been faster today but out of the final corner I had a little issue so I lost a few tenths there. 

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“But then on the softest tyre I didn’t feel the grip like it should have been, so we have to look into that. 

“But on the long runs we were quite competitive on the medium tyre, I think that will be the most dominant tyre, so let’s see. Still a bit of work to do.”

New teammate Pierre Gasly was only 12th in the FP2 standings and concurred with Verstappen’s view on Red Bull’s Soft tyre struggles. 

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“FP1 was good,” the Frenchman said. “FP2 was good as well, but with the soft tyres we tried something and it didn’t really work.

“We are still lacking a bit of pace with the soft tyres, but we will work tonight to find out for tomorrow.”

Both drivers were not surprised to see Ferrari return to form in Bahrain, after beating the Italian team to the podium at the Melbourne season-opener. 

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“I don’t know what went wrong in Melbourne but now they are very competitive again – so that is what we expected,” Verstappen explained. 

Gasly added: “We knew they would be fast, especially on this track. They have been fast every year and I think Australia was weird. But they clearly look very strong this weekend.”