Horner: "Albon was a lot closer to Verstappen than in Russia"

For Alexander Albon, the Eifel Grand Prix turned out to be a disappointment. He retired with bad luck, but just before that he had already made it quite difficult for himself in battle with the AlphaTauri drivers.

Things started to go wrong for Albon when, in his first stint, he locked a brake and flat spotted his tyres. Team boss Christian Horner explains in Red Bull Racing's online press release that they had no choice but to bring him in earlier. Nevertheless, he thinks Albon could have fought for the podium afterwards.

Albon had a good weekend

“Our concern was that he’d pretty much gone through the canvas. We were seeing the vibrations increasing and increasing to the point where it was past our threshold. So from a safety point of view we had to pit him at that point. He then started to make good progress back through the field, but he was very unlucky that he picked up some debris that pierced the radiator.

"It’s a shame, I think he would’ve raced Perez and Ricciardo, even with that flatspot in the early stages. It’s a shame that didn’t come to fruition today, because he’s had a pretty sensible weekend. He was a lot closer to his teammate than he was in Russia,” Horner said.