‘Not right’ – Marko’s worrying admission despite Red Bull’s ‘narrowed’ gap

Helmut Marko may be quick to claim that Red Bull narrowed the gap in Q3, but he concedes “something is not right” with Max Verstappen only eighth fastest in qualifying in Hungary.

Red Bull has endured a difficult weekend at the Hungaroring with lead driver Max Verstappen 14th after Friday’s second practice, over a second down on Lando Norris, with Yuki Tsunoda faring better in ninth place, 0.8s off the pace.

Helmut Marko: That shows something is not right

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Come the end of qualifying, Verstappen qualified eighth fastest while Tsunoda was eliminated in Q1 in 16th place.

The reigning World Champion lamented a costly lack of grip.

“I mean, looking at the whole weekend, I think we are happy to be in Q3 because I’ve been more outside of the top 10 than in,” Verstappen told media, including PlanetF1.com, after qualifying.

“It’s been difficult this whole weekend. No grip, front and rear, and it was the same in qualifying.”

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Red Bull came close to a double Q1 elimination as Yuki Tsunoda went out in 16th place, while Verstappen was only 0.163s quicker than his team-mate in 11th place.

Eighth in Q2, the reigning World Champion was 0.143s away from 11th place and the drop zone.

Through to the pole position shoot-out, Verstappen qualified in eighth place where he was 0.356s down on pole-sitter Charles Leclerc having clocked his fastest lap on a set of used tyres.

Marko was relieved.

“Thank God we still found something,” the Red Bull motorsport advisor told Sky Deutschland.

“The gap to the leaders has narrowed considerably, but something is still not right, because we were faster with used tyres.

“That shows something is not right.”

Marko, though, is not throwing in the towel.

Despite McLaren dominating the practice sessions with a hat-trick of one-two finishes, and then setting the pace in Q1 and Q2, Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris were beaten to pole position by Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.

That gives Marko hope that anything can happen in Sunday’s race.

“Now let’s see how this develops further,” Marko said. “Obviously, the lower temperature has changed a lot.

“Charles Leclerc’s pole came more or less out of nowhere, amazing. I didn’t think anyone was capable of beating McLaren at this circuit.

“I think it might be two stops. Yuki Tsunoda drove in the points last year with one-stop.

“A lot is possible, we saw that in Formula 2. There it was quite intense and there was a lot of overtaking. Interestingly enough, that seems to be easier here [compared to Belgium].”

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