Red Bull boss shares damning take on Zandvoort pace: 'Nowhere to hide'
Photo: Race Pictures
15:01, 27 Aug
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Kada Sárközi joined GPblog as an editor ahead of the 2023 Formula 1 season. He graduated with a BA in Sports Journalism in the UK and has covered Grands Prix and other F1 events live.
Red Bull Racing team principal Laurent Mekies was straightforward in his assessment after a difficult Dutch Grand Prix for the Austrian outfit.
Last Sunday was a day to forget for the Milton Keynes-based squad at Zandvoort. To begin with, at his final home race in Formula 1 for the foreseeable future, Max Verstappen crashed out on the very first lap.
"Difficult weekend here in Zandvoort. First of all, I think the most important thing is that Max is okay. It was a pretty big shunt and we are all glad to see that he's out of the car, unharmed, and that's what matters the most," the French team boss began.
Mekies critical of Red Bull's pace
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Mekies continued: "Performance-wise I think there is nowhere to hide. It was a very difficult weekend. It seems like we have made a bit of a step back compared to where we were before the summer break. Of course, we'll never know what the results will be the real pace of the car in the race will have been with Max, but it's fair to say that session after session it looked more difficult than it was in Budapest or in Spa or in Austria."
Photo: Race Pictures
He added: "So, some tough work for us to do to regroup and to see if it is simply the competition that has done a better job than us at upgrading the car or if something has been limiting us more than it should have been here in Zandvoort. That will be for us the next two weeks before we fight back in Monza all together.
Liam Lawson finished seventh at Zandvoort, having to step in for an injured Hadjar. Mekies also complimented the New Zealander.
"On Liam, he's done a good job stepping into the car. It's never easy to step into a different team and a different car for a race like that, and he's done a good job. Only one tenth away from Max yesterday in qualifying, and today he took the points that were available to him pacewise with the seventh place.
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"So we also had Isack with us this weekend, even though he couldn't drive, he was with the team trying to take the learning and trying to make sure we can push all together as strongly as we can next week in Monza," he concluded.
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