Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

Red Bull knows how to 'make Verstappen happy' amid heavy criticism of 2026 F1 cars

21:02, 14 Feb

byKada Sarkozi

Red Bull Racing's Technical Director, Pierre Waché, explained that his team's goal is not to make Max Verstappen grow fond of the new regulations, but to have an RB22 that wins Grands Prix with the Dutchman behind the wheel.

"It is not my goal to make him happy [about the regulations]. It's to make him happy by winning races."

- Pierre Waché

Verstappen was especially critical of the new regulations during the pre-season test in Bahrain. The Dutchman said that the new Formula 1 cars are like 'Formula E on steroids'.

Speaking to Dutch media, the four-time world champion did not address the FIA or Formula 1 directly, but commented that "they maybe didn’t fully realize how bad it would be."

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Pierre Waché - Photo: Race Pictures

Wache focuses on developing the car they have to work with

"It is not my goal to make him happy [about the regulations]. It's to make him happy by winning races," the Technical Director commented on the matter to GPblog, among others, in Sakhir.

He continued: "My job and the job of the team at my level are to make sure that we give him the tools so that he's able to compete at the front.

"And the regulation itself and how the car design is in terms of how we feel the car is due to this regulation is outside of my remit, it is an FIA discussion we can have outside of us. And we can participate in that, but the main purpose and the main focus is to make the car better."