Max Verstappen was forced to settle for second place in Sunday’s Austrian Grand Prix, with the Oracle Red Bull Racing driver struggling with tyre degradation throughout the race.
Despite winning the Sprint race on Saturday and starting on pole position on Sunday, Verstappen was unable to match the kind of pace the Scuderia Ferrari drivers had, and he was passed by eventual winner Charles Leclerc on three occasions at the Red Bull Ring.
The Dutchman was still happy to walk away with the points for second place, and he says it is important to maximise the potential of the car in every race even if they are not fighting for the win.
“We were just a bit too slow today, we were doing the best we could with the strategy but the Ferraris were extremely fast,” said Verstappen. “Of course, we need to understand why we had so much degradation with the tyres, I’m not sure exactly what happened, no matter which compound we used none of them seemed to work well.
“Although we didn’t win today, we still walked away with a lot of points. In difficult moments you need to score points and we did that today.”
Verstappen was thankful for the support he received throughout the weekend in Austria, although he condemned those who were abusive to others, and he says there is no room within the sport for those kind of actions.
“It was incredible to receive the support I did from the fans this weekend, but I’ve been hearing a few shocking things,” he said. “It’s clearly wrong and what’s been happening is not right at all – I shouldn’t need to say this on a weekend that should be a celebration of Formula 1 at our home race.”
“I thought I had good opportunities coming my way” – Sergio Pérez
Team-mate Sergio Pérez saw his chances of fighting for a podium and even points end on the opening lap in Austria, with contact with George Russell seeing him spin into the gravel trap and suffer damage to his RB18.
Pérez was attempting to move up from fifth into fourth heading down towards turn four and was going around the outside of the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team driver, only for the two to make contact and send the Mexican into a spin.
He re-joined at the back of the field and pitted for repairs, but his pace thereafter was not strong, and he retired not long afterwards. He is already focusing on the future and looking to rebound in the French Grand Prix where he hopes Red Bull can return to the front of the field ahead of Ferrari.
“It was a big shame that we had our race ended so early,” said Pérez. “I had the whole race ahead of me and I thought I had good opportunities coming my way, so it was very painful.
“We had a lot of damage to the car and we were going nowhere so we had to retire. I gave all the room I could to George on lap one, there was enough room for both cars not to crash and unfortunately, we ended up colliding, I don’t know what else I could have done.
“Today has hurt us in both Championships and hopefully we can recover the ground. It has been the same way all season, sometimes we are quicker and sometimes Ferrari are. It is still very close but today they were clearly the quicker car.
“We need to look forward now, the season is long and hopefully we can come back stronger in the coming weekends.”
Sergio Pérez was forced to retire after suffering damage in a collision with George Russell – Credit: Clive Rose/Getty Images