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The Red Bull Racing team's consultant, Helmut Marko, has shared his concern over the high speeds of the McLaren vehicles piloted by Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, both of whom overtook Max Verstappen during this past weekend's Miami Grand Prix. Marko shared his thoughts on how the RBR driver was on par with the McLaren team at the start, but fell victim to their speed, and admitted that if the Dutchman hadn't started on pole, the gap would've been larger.
After Verstappen started on pole, he was able to keep the lead after a battle between him and second-place starter Norris saw the British driver drop down to P6, allowing Kimi Antonelli and Oscar Piastri through. Piastri eventually overtook Antonelli, and by lap 14, despite Verstappen's strong defence, the Australian driver had taken the lead of the race.
Four laps later, Norris' climb up through the grid had ended, and he overtook Verstappen for second place. Compared to McLaren's insane speed, Marko attributed the Dutchman's capability to lead that long purely to his skill. He said (via GP Blog)
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"We just weren't fast enough. Over one lap, Max was fully competitive. He compensates a lot with his skills, which I call the Max factor. But unfortunately, during the race, we saw that the McLarens can run at bizarre speeds."
"But that gap, that's a lot. And the gap would have been even bigger if Max hadn't been racing in front of the McLarens in the first few laps to slow them down."
Marko also commended George Russell, who managed to steal P3 from Verstappen and hold on till the end of the race.
"As George Russell's third place shows, Mercedes is also stronger [than us], so we need to come up with something good," he mentioned.
After the Miami GP, McLaren sit at the top of the constructors' table with 246 points, Mercedes are behind them with 141, and Red Bull hold third place with 105 points after the first six races of the 2025 season.
"A bit of a struggle out there": Max Verstappen reflects on battle with McLaren
Speaking after the Miami Grand Prix, which finally saw him secure a P4 finish, Max Verstappen addressed his tough battle with the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, as well as the podium place loss to George Russell.
“I said yesterday that I would try to do my very best and I think we did that today, but unfortunately [we] just didn’t have the pace," Verstappen told Formula 1 after qualifying.
“We were overheating a lot on the tyres, so it was just quite a bit of a struggle out there, and then of course we got a bit unlucky with the VSC as well, but that’s racing as well.” [via F1]
Despite his P4 finish, Verstappen still sits in third place in the Drivers' Championship with 99 points, but the gap between him and championship leader Piastri is now 32 points.
