Mercedes' speed puts pressure on Red Bull: 'Got some catching up to do'

Christian Horner sees the Brazilian Grand Prix weekend as damage limitation. Red Bull Racing went to the Interlagos circuit as favourites but will have to settle for second and fourth.

A disqualification and a grid penalty did not prevent Lewis Hamilton from taking victory after all. It was a scenario that few people anticipated. Max Verstappen was seen as the big favourite for this race, but there was no limit for Hamilton and Mercedes this weekend.

''To come away with second and fourth today, plus the fastest lap was damage limitation this weekend. We scored 20 points for Max this weekend versus their 25 for Lewis in the Drivers’ Championship, so we’ll take that. We put up as good a defence as we could, Max did his best and raced hard,'' the team boss of the Austrian racing stable revealed in the press release.

''But we saw Mercedes pace from Friday and then again yesterday, so today wasn’t too much of a surprise. They did a good job and Lewis drove a great race today, so well done to them. We’ve got some catching up to do this week. There’s a lot of racing still to go, so we’ll brush ourselves down and come back fighting in Doha'', concludes the Brit.