Red Bull Team Principal Laurent Mekies admits that “being able to fight for the win” during the Singapore Grand Prix “means a lot” after Max Verstappen finished second in Sunday’s race.
The four-time and reigning World Champion entered the race in Singapore having claimed two wins on the bounce after Red Bull found extra performance from its RB21.
While Verstappen was unable to win at Singapore – still the only venue on the current F1 calendar where he has yet to stand on the top step – the Dutchman pushed winner George Russell throughout at a track where Red Bull has struggled the last few seasons.
“Being able to fight for the win here, it means a lot,” said Mekies about the team’s performance. “After Monza, Baku, it was very different. You never know until you are coming.
“We’ve been able to be in the right rhythms from Friday. We were in the right rhythm in Qualifying. It was very, very close to call, and we were in the right rhythm in the race.
“If you look, we finished a few seconds away from George. This is good news. It means that what we have unlocked is not only low downforce specific.
“We will not change our approach. We’ll continue to take it race by race. We’ll continue to take the learnings.”
Red Bull’s increased performance in the last three Grands Prix has crucially come on very different circuits, with Monza and Baku requiring a low downforce set-up while Singapore required a higher downforce configuration.
Despite missing out on a hat-trick of victories, Verstappen outscored Drivers’ Championship leader Oscar Piastri and McLaren team mate Lando Norris for the third consecutive race, and now sits 63 and 41 points behind respectively with six Grands Prix and three Sprints remaining.
“I think everybody has been working extremely hard in Milton Keynes, from race one to now, and never giving up on trying to unlock the potential of that car. It is fair to say that the progress in the last few weeks have been quite spectacular,” added Mekies.
“And it’s credit to everyone, again, back at home, that have never given up. It’s credit to Max, that has been, with his sensitivity, pushing us to explore different avenues. And finally, we found an avenue that unlocked a bit of performance.
“There is no single silver bullet. So, there have been a good flow of updates. There have been different ways to run the car.”
