Verstappen Says Red Bull Upgrade Still Leaves Gaps
NXTbets Pro | Published On: July 6, 2026
Verstappen Third
Red Bull driver Max Verstappen took third in Sprint Qualifying for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, but the result came with a warning. Lewis Hamilton claimed Sprint pole and Kimi Antonelli qualified second, leaving Verstappen a little more than three-tenths of a second back from the front row. Verstappen did not frame the lap as a clean step forward. He said the run could just as easily have put him sixth or seventh, which matched the way he described a session where the margins stayed tight at the top. The Red Bull driver said the lap left him with more questions than satisfaction because the car still fought him through the corners and never gave him the stability he wanted to attack every phase of the run with full confidence. He also said the RB22 felt only slightly better in qualifying than it had in practice, a sign that the team had made progress without closing the gap to the leaders. That put his third-place effort in perspective. It kept him close to the front of the Sprint grid, but it also showed that Red Bull still had work to do if it wanted to challenge the pace set by Hamilton and Antonelli.
Red Bull Upgrade
The upgrade package Red Bull introduced since the Austrian Grand Prix has improved the car, but Verstappen said it has not solved the core problems. He said the team still had issues with cornering, energy deployment and overall balance, three areas that mattered at Silverstone because the circuit's long flat-out sections put a premium on how a car managed power and battery use across a lap. Verstappen also said Ferrari and Mercedes appeared to have stronger pace on Saturday, which added to the sense that Red Bull sat a step behind the teams at the sharp end even after the update. He pointed back to practice, where he had been sixth and had run nearly one second off the pace. That session gave Red Bull a clear reference point, and Sprint Qualifying only narrowed the gap a little. The contrast between practice and qualifying showed a car that moved in the right direction but still lacked the complete platform Verstappen wanted. The upgrade gave Red Bull enough to stay in the mix for position. It did not give him the balance or deployment edge he needed to make Silverstone a weekend where raw pace alone would carry the fight.
Sprint Battle
Verstappen said the Sprint would be more about fighting the cars behind him than challenging the front-row runners, and the opening laps backed up that view. He pointed to Charles Leclerc and George Russell as the likely challengers behind him, but the bigger pressure arrived as soon as the 17-lap race started on Saturday. Lando Norris and Russell both got past Verstappen at the start, turning his third-place grid spot into an early scrap rather than a controlled run at the leaders. He then nearly lost more positions after he tried an outside move on Russell at Turn 3, a move that showed how little margin he had once the race began. The start fit the picture he had drawn after qualifying. Verstappen had enough pace to line up near the front, but he did not have enough advantage to defend third without a fight. Silverstone's long straights also kept energy deployment and battery management in focus, which put a premium on clean execution as much as speed. Verstappen's day showed that balance. The car put him in position, but it did not give him the cushion he needed to hold that spot without pressure from the cars around him.
