Christian Horner: Max Verstappen more likely to stay at Red Bull now?

Nevertheless, Verstappen should be in peace, more importantly, they revolve around the performance.

Red Bull has come a long way from the dominant form of 2022, 2023 and 2024 until the first few races.

McLaren is now the leading power of F1. On average, Red Bull still has the second fastest car this year, but Verstappen has been unhappy for a while.

He complains about the bad balance. In qualification, it can still make it more or less competitive in certain track species. Last weekend, high -speed circuits, including Silverstone, have four polar positions this year. This McLaren’s championship leader is up to Oscar Piastri.

However, Red Bull in the races rarely compete with McLaren.

The competitive paintings in F1 returned last season at Miami Grand Prix, about 14 months ago. This was the last race on Newey’s Red Bull Pit Wall, and at the weekend, McLaren made a big upgrade to his car -changing cars.

Lando Norris took his hymen victory in Miami that weekend. Verstappen continued to win for a while, but in the middle of last season, McLaren was the car to be defeated. During the last winter, they made a lot of progress and went further this season.

When Red Bull was introduced in 2022, he nailed the existing regulations and launched a period of domination, but they are now behind.

This leads to obvious questions about the Red Bull Technical Department of Newey.

At one level, it can be said that the new rules introduced next year give Red Bull a chance to reset.

In another, if one team is competitive under the existing rules, there is at least a reasonable possibility that they will continue to do so under the next ones.

Then there is a problem of introducing new engines for 2026. They increase the total power ratio provided by the electricity part of the engine to approximately 50%.

Red Bull produces its own engines with the help of Ford at new internal engine facilities. The word on the street in F1 is that Mercedes is a new power unit than Red Bull. No one knows for sure until it starts next year, but Verstappen has an ear and is worried.

Max Verstappen, of course, does not have to choose to leave. Instead of Gamble, he can wait and see what the competitive landscape looks next year. However, if he is convinced that Red Bull will not win the race, he may not think of leaving too much risk.