Marko points out culprit for the McLarens' Lap 1 crash

After the Sprint in Austin, GPblog spoke exclusively with Marko. On Friday, the Austrian had already talked about the fact that Red Bull needs help from McLaren to become champion. When asked if this is the help they wanted, Marko started to laugh.

He said: "No, it was only a sprint race. I mean this time I don't think it was the fault of the McLaren drivers. It looked like [it was] more [of] Alonso's, but all that can happen.

"As long as it is theoretically possible we will fight for it," he said regarding the driver's title.

During the race, Verstappen did complain about the balance of his car, mainly about the rear of the RB21. When asked about this, Marko commented: "Yeah, it is such a bumpy circuit, everybody had problems. And it was just, Russell tried to catch him and he overheated his tyres. Then the race was over."

According to Marko, the pace that Russell showed at the beginning of the race cannot be replicated by Mercedes in Sunday's Grand Prix."If you are ruining your tyres then you can do [that pace], but on the race distance (you can't)."

Verstappen himself was not completely confident in a good Grand Prix after the Sprint. The Dutchman said that he was 'not entirely happy with the pace,' and added that the team needs to work hard to keep the McLarens at bay on Sunday, assuming they don't crash again.

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