Bafflement after longrun Verstappen: 'Where is the tyre deg?'

Red Bull Racing is back on top in Japan after a disappointing weekend in Singapore. Max Verstappen was the fastest driver in both free practice sessions on Friday and also seemed fastest in the longruns. F1 analyst Peter Windsor argues that everyone actually knew that the Austrian formation's weekend in Singapore was just an outlier.

In Singapore, Red Bull had a disappointing weekend. For the first time since the 2018 Russian Grand Prix, both Red Bull drivers failed to make it through the final part of qualifying. Things improved on Sunday, but not as well as in the other races this season, breaking the winning streak of Verstappen and his team. In the first two free practice sessions in Japan, though, Verstappen was again tremendously fast, Windsor also observed.

"Which left everybody thinking: 'We knew Singapore was an anomaly'. Despite all the whispering in the garage at the time, despite all the stuff out in the media about how the FIA have really clamped down on Red Bull’s flexi-floor and skid box and so forth. Absolutely back where they belong, I say belong cause they have such a great car.," Windsor said on his YouTube channel.

As usual, longruns were completed by the drivers in the latter part of the second free practice session. Verstappen seems to be the favourite for Sunday after these longer runs and Windsor was stunned by the Dutchman's laps. "He did that run on the test tyre, and you can see, probably everybody is thinking, I wish we took this test tyre, for the fuel run. A really good run, a 36.4 quickest of the day in terms of fuel. A 37.5, 37.5 and 37.4, where is the [tyre] deg? 37.8, 38.0, 38.2, really good run from Max at the end of FP2," says the F1 analyst.