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Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies says seeing Max Verstappen going in search of a fifth consecutive drivers’ championship is a chance to watch history in the making.
Verstappen has cut Oscar Piastri’s championship lead from 104 points to 40 over the past four races, as Red Bull has made a step forward in performance with its car. Mekies says Verstappen’s influence in those gains should not be underestimated, as he continues to help push the team forward.
“I think watching Max driving is watching history in the making,” Mekies said. “He surprises us every time he goes out on track – with how much he’s pushing us between one session and another, how much sensitivity he has in stuff that sometimes we can see and sometimes we cannot see.”
Mekies says the final part of the season looks set to be particularly intense as no one team is showing consistently better pace compared to its rivals, with Mercedes and Ferrari also in the mix with McLaren.
“I think it’s fair to say that in terms of relative performance [McLaren] don’t have the advantage they had in the first part of the season anymore compared to us. Even back in Spa when we won the Sprint, we were still a fair half a second slower than them every lap. Even in Zandvoort after the shutdown we were still probably half a second slower than them every lap.
“So I think that has now gone and we are in a situation where you go to a race weekend and you have three or four teams that can fight for the win if they extract everything they can and their car can produce on that track.
“I don’t think anyone is in a dominant position, I think every of the remaining races will be about which one of these four teams is nailing the track layout, the conditions, the temperatures, the tires – and then that guy will win the race.”
Verstappen admits he’s relishing the chance to try and overturn the deficit to McLaren, as it feels like he has nothing to lose in chasing Piastri and Lando Norris down.
“We are having some really good weekends,” Verstappen said. “And of course we also know that we need to be perfect until the end of the season to have a chance, but we will try, and if we succeed then of course it’s amazing. If we don’t we tried everything we could until the end and we kept it exciting and that’s I think the spirit for us.
“It’s positive pressure. We don’t feel like it’s putting anything on us. We’re not stressed about it, we’re just going flat out.”
