Max Verstappen has made his ultimate target for the 2026 season crystal clear: he wants to win at least one race. The four-time World Champion is feeling the momentum shift after stacking up a series of podium finishes, leaving him hungrier than ever to climb back onto the top step.
It has been a genuinely tricky campaign for Red Bull, who currently find themselves sitting fourth in the Teams' Championship. But the Milton Keynes-based outfit has clawed its way forward in recent Grands Prix. That upward trajectory culminated in a brilliant 2-3 finish in Azerbaijan, where Verstappen crossed the finish line less than two tenths behind race winner George Russell, narrowly missing out on that elusive first victory of the year.
We'll learn a lot now over these coming races of what we need, what we want to do with the car. We're anyway not fighting for the championship, so for us it's a big learning curve,
Speaking to the media ahead of the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia, Verstappen acknowledged that while he has managed to outscore Ferrari and McLaren across the last three races, there is still a massive mountain to climb. "Unfortunately, we're not outscoring Mercedes," Verstappen said. "They're actually the fastest ones, or at least they were for most of the season. But yeah, I'm trying everything I can. We are scoring quite a few podiums now, but I want to win. That's what I'm here for, and I'm getting close, but I want at least to win one race this year, so I hope we can do it of course at some point. We have some solid results."
Reflecting on the recent updates brought to the machine, the Dutchman noted that the new parts in Baku worked exceptionally well, though he tempered expectations by noting the circuit's uniquely specific layout with its 90-degree corners and lack of high-speed sections. With the championship out of reach, the remainder of 2026 serves as a massive development laboratory for Red Bull and teammate Isack Hadjar to figure out what they need for next year.
"We'll learn a lot now over these coming races of what we need, what we want to do with the car. We're anyway not fighting for the championship, so for us it's a big learning curve," Verstappen explained. When pressed on whether looking ahead to 2027 is the primary focus—especially with Mercedes bringing a fresh upgrade to Bahrain—he admitted it will be a tricky gap to close. "Yeah, probably. I mean, normally, if you bring an upgrade, it should go faster, so with them already being at the pace that they are, it will probably be very tricky. But yeah, it doesn't matter. Every single weekend, we'll try and do our best and we'll see where that leads us this weekend."
As the series heads back to the Sepang International Circuit—where the 29-year-old was the winner during its last F1 event in 2017—those fond memories of the venue come rushing back. "I always enjoyed racing here because I think I really liked the track layout," Verstappen said of the brutally hot and physically demanding circuit with its high tyre degradation. "It was not very straightforward because there's always high degradation, hot in general, so quite uncomfortable in a way to drive physically. But yeah, great memories."
