Max Verstappen labels Red Bull ‘undrivable’ after Suzuka Q2 exit shock

Max Verstappen has opened up on his “undrivable” Red Bull, having been knocked out in the second part of qualifying at Suzuka.

The four-time F1 World Champion was eliminated in Q2, being outqualified by Red Bull teammate Isack Hadjar for a second time in three race weekends.

Max Verstappen struggles with Red Bull balance at Suzuka qualifying

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Verstappen had spent his off weekend racing at the Nurburgring, taking victory in his Mercedes-AMG GT3 machine before his squad was disqualified for a tyre usage infraction, but was brought back down to earth after resuming the day job.

The Dutch driver was knocked out in 11th place in Q2, with his 1:30.262 being 1.214 seconds off the pace of Kimi Antonelli’s fastest time of the session.

More critically, his time was also almost two-tenths of a second down on Isack Hadjar in the other Red Bull, with the French driver outqualifying his illustrious teammate once again after initially doing so at the first race in Australia.

Realising his day had ended earlier than expected, Verstappen took to the team radio sounding more disappointed than angry, saying that he’d felt the car had become undrivable through qualifying as it jumped around through the higher-speed corners.

“[It was] not good. We thought we had fixed a little bit in FP3. But then, going into qualifying, it was again very difficult,” Verstappen explained after the session.

“Yeah, just sliding a lot, but, at the same time, also not having the rotation mid-corner, everywhere.

“So that makes it quite a complicated balance. So yeah, that’s not ideal around here.

“I think we have bigger problems than we had last year. Yeah, some parts of the car at the moment are not working how we want them to work.”

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Red Bull rolled out with upgrades to the RB22 for this weekend, including revised sidepod inlets and floor, as well as a new engine cover, but Verstappen said he wasn’t feeling many positives from the new components.

“The car never turns mid-corner, but at the same time, we just oversteer a lot on entries. So yeah, it’s really difficult, unpredictable,” he said.

“There’s still a lot of understeer in the car, but, in qualifying, it was, again, for me, undrivable, so that’s something that we need to look at.

“I mean, also, I’m driving with a different aero package this weekend, but it seems like that’s not working. So that’s also not very good.”

Asked to explain what he means by the car being “undrivable”, he said, “We have problems I cannot explain in detail here, that we know are there.  Sometimes it’s a bit worse than other times. And I think in qualifying, it just came back to a point where it became undrivable.”

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