In the first two practice sessions for the Monaco Grand Prix, Red Bull’s star driver, Max Verstappen, only managed to set the third and fourth fastest laps of the respective sessions. Safe to say, he was quite dissatisfied with his performance, and even more so with the fact that Ferrari are quite ahead of them. However, his team boss, Christian Horner, disagrees and thinks that they can make the gap to the Italian team.

As Verstappen failed to perform his best during practice, Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz managed to come second on the timesheets during FP1. Then, in FP2, Charles Leclerc finished fastest followed by Max’s teammate, Sainz.

Then, in quali, Leclerc secured provisional pole, and just as Verstappen, P2 at the time, was heading for his flying lap, the Monegasque crashed and brought out the red flags. Since only 18 seconds were left on the clock, the authorities decided not to restart the session, which meant that the Dutchman missed out on pole to the Italian team.

As Verstappen urged his team to perform better, he also pointed out how far ahead Ferrari are.

He warned Red Bull by saying, “The gap with Ferrari is extra big because they are doing well and we are not.”

Horner states that Max Verstappen should not be disappointed with himself

Speaking to Sky Sports, as quoted by Racingnews365, Horner said, “We have indeed a bit too much understeer for Max’s wishes and we also did not get the tires working optimally.”

Even though he admitted his team’s shortcomings, the Red Bull team boss disputed Max’s claim about the Italian team.

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“I don’t think we are very far behind Ferrari. We have to filter that out and hopefully, we’ll be back on Saturday,” Horner concluded. (Translated from Dutch via Google)

Verstappen admits that he was “too slow” at the Monaco GP

The first four races went quite well for the Dutchman. He ended up on the podium at every single race and also had considerable pace during quali. However, things were different at Monte Carlo. as he didn’t make it into the usual top two in FP, like he is is used to.

Speaking to Sky Sports, Max said, “We are too slow. Not just a little bit, I think quite a bit. We have to really find some pace, because everyone has traffic so you have to look more to optimum lap times, optimum sectors, and we are quite off.

“It also didn’t feel great to drive. Normally I’m quite comfortable in the car, quite easily get to a pace but it all takes too long and just not how I like it. So far it’s the most difficult weekend,” Verstappen concluded.

Now that he’s in P2, do you think Verstappen can overtake Leclerc at a tricky circuit that doesn’t allow overtaking and bring an end to his podium drought in Monaco? Or do you reckon Verstappen is right and Ferrari will finally secure a race win?

Do you think Max can find the pace in the Red Bull car and make the gap to the Ferraris?

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