Red Bull arrives in the United States following two consecutive race victories in Malaysia and Singapore, but as FormulaUno.it reports, the team's machine is far from a comfortable ride. The four-time world champion Max Verstappen took both of those triumphs, looking every bit the driver he was until the end of last season now that he has a car worthy of the situation. Fresh updates have certainly helped a lot, highlighting the strong work done at Milton Keynes. Yet life in the other half of the garage was rather more complicated for Isack Hadjar, who was forced into a recovery drive after a gearbox failure during qualifying in Singapore. Even so, the Frenchman has proven this year that he is fully up to a task many others have failed to handle in recent seasons.
Speaking about the latest Red Bull updates, Hadjar made it clear they have not wiped away all of the machine's old habits. "I think the car is still very difficult to drive. In Malaysia it was dominant, but I don't think in Singapore it was the fastest," he explained. He even offered a striking assessment of how the RB22 stacked up against the SF-26 at Marina Bay, stating that if Verstappen had been behind the wheel of the Ferrari, the margin of victory would have been even greater. Still, Verstappen had squeezed every drop out of the equipment by snatching pole position by half a tenth and making the difference in Q3.
Looking back on his own messy weekend, Hadjar admitted it was one of those events where mistakes happen in every single session, though he is eager for a clean weekend in Texas now that he is on a track he genuinely loves. Meanwhile, Verstappen has thrown his full support behind team principal Laurent Mekies regarding his recent contract renewal, calling him a hardworking and good leader who deserves the extension after a tough year. Looking ahead after those scorching wins in Malaysia and Singapore, the Dutchman warned that those hot, humid conditions suited their engine well, and a dry track in the US brings entirely new variables.
Verstappen also didn't hold back when addressing the physical toll of modern machinery and the bumpy state of the Texan circuit. Calling the track's bumps unacceptable and out of control, he pointed out that grinding them down is merely a sedative for the primary problem. The physical consequences are brutally real, with Verstappen revealing that vertical loads hit over 9G on his spine last year during cornering and heavy braking moments. After medical checks, he admitted that the lower part of his spine is not in great shape, warning that accepting these brutal conditions as normal will only cause further harm.
With both drivers keeping their feet firmly on the ground despite the recent trophy haul, Red Bull knows the weaknesses of their package aren't going away anytime soon. They cannot change the car's current flaws this year, leaving the squad to focus purely on the present while hoping for bigger fixes next season. For now, the beast from Milton Keynes remains a terrifyingly fast handful, whether it is conquering the humidity of Asia or bouncing over the asphalt in the United States.
