Max Verstappen has praised Laurent Mekies for the dramatic turnaround at Red Bull, after a dominant win over McLaren at the Italian Grand Prix. Verstappen believes the team are approaching race weekends with a clearer focus on set-up, after a challenging 18 months for the team.
In their first win since Mekies took over as Team Boss from Christian Horner, Verstappen pulled a 20-second lead on Lando Norris – the largest margin so far this season. Advisor Helmut Marko has also come out in support of Mekies’ leadership, with the Italian clearly cementing himself at the head of the team.
Max Verstappen views Laurent Mekies’ engineering background as a major asset
When speaking to the media after the race weekend in Monza, Verstappen expressed that the team had been struggling with their car set-up, feeling as though they had been blindly searching for answers to their technical issues. However, with Mekies in charge, the former engineer seems to be moving in the right direction.
Verstappen said: “We were not fully understanding what to do. With Laurent having an engineering background, he’s asking the right questions to the engineers – common-sense questions – so I think that works really well.”
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According to the team, the car has not undergone any major upgrades or changes, and the progress they are seeing on track is down to a better optimisation of the package they currently have. Any new upgrades will have been developed under Horner, given the production turnaround time.
Helmut Marko was shocked at the Monza performance and remains impressed by Mekies
Marko, long-time adviser at Red Bull, is clearly impressed with the progress made so far under the new leadership. It has been rumoured that he was unhappy with the direction Horner was taking and was instrumental in his exit.
Speaking to Motorsport.com, Marko said: “Laurent is an excellent engineer, so now the idea is more to take whatever the simulation shows us, but mix that with the experience that Max has and with the experience that our racing engineers have. That’s how we want to make a car that is more predictable and drivable.
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“This is the product of that. Basically, it’s the same product as we had before, just some upgrades were coming and they are working. But 20 seconds on McLaren, I wouldn’t have predicted that.”
Red Bull will also be hoping for a drastic turnaround in Yuki Tsunoda’s performance, after he struggles to match the performance of teammate Verstappen. With McLaren sprinting ahead in both the Constructors’ and Drivers’ Championship, can Verstappen and Red Bull ruffle some feathers?
