Max Verstappen draws painful conclusion, believes this is the maximum he can achieve

Talking to GPblog among others after yesterday's session, the defending world champion saw the title move further away.

After Friday at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, Verstappen explained he had an okay Friday, but there were things to improve on his car. He then qualified on the second row of the grid.

"The aim for me tomorrow is a podium, preferably in the middle, but that's not realistic. Unless, of course, you get lucky, but it's also tight behind me," the Dutchman began.

With the new technical directive being introduced in terms of the flexible front wing, some hoped at Red Bull that the grid order will be mixed up as a result. However, McLaren claimed a dominant one-two in Qualifying.

"Looking at the entire season, we've always been a bit behind. If they made some mistakes, then you could benefit from that. It's not that it's now very negative. That's just the reality you've been dealing with all season. And of course, some circuits are worse for us than others," Verstappen continued.

Red Bull also hoped they could be closer in Barcelona, but that did not affect Verstappen, as he prefers to see data from the track.

Meanwhile, Yuki Tsunoda will start from last place on the grid. The Dutchman also talked about that it's wasn't Tsunoda's fault yesterday, and pointed to the RB21 instead.

This article was written in collaboration with Hidde Korte