Max Verstappen and Laurent Mekies

Verstappen gives candid verdict on Red Bull's new structure under Mekies after Spa Sprint win

13:42, 26 Jul

Updated: 14:50, 26 Jul

bySamson Ero

Max Verstappen shared his honest assessment of the Red Bull Racing team’s operations under new boss, Laurent Mekies. The Dutch driver admitted that it’s been a little difficult to adjust to the sudden changes that have taken place within the team over the last two weeks.

Mekies, who was appointed as a replacement for Christian Horner following his dismissal by the Red Bull Racing hierarchy, was present in the team’s pit lane for the first time during the Belgian Grand Prix Sprint. Verstappen, who clinched victory at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit, however, detailed how motivated the new team boss is.

Sharing his thoughts during his interaction with the media, including GPBlog, the four-time world champion stated:

“I mean, it's very difficult to, within two weeks, suddenly say a lot of things need to change out of the blue. It's about starting the relationship and just understanding how everyone is operating. And then at one point, you know, you come to conclusions and maybe you want to change something.

“This is something that will happen over the coming weeks, months. Um, so it's, it's really early days, but so far, um, you know, he's very keen and very motivated and that's exactly what you want also. I get on very well with him. It's been a very good start.”

Verstappen speaks on new engineer for Belgian Grand Prix weekend

Max Verstappen also worked with a different race engineer for the Belgian Grand Prix weekend. Regular race engineer Giampiero Lambiase was unavailable due to personal reasons, with Simon Rennie stepping in to fill the role of the Italian. Sharing his thoughts on his temporary race engineer, Verstappen stated:

“And I get on very well with him. It's been a very good start. And also with Simon, he has a lot of racing experience already. And of course, he's been part of the team for a very long time.

The last few years, he hasn’t been in a race engineer role, but he stepped in and was immediately on it. So again, very enjoyable to work with Simon.”