For Max Verstappen, only sixth place was achieved on the first day of free practice in Bahrain, almost half a second off the top, from the best time recorded by Lewis Hamilton with Mercedes. However, the Dutchman said he was calm and not worried about the time recorded today, as well as the deficit of the seven-time world champion.
From the start of the first round, the Red Bull driver complained both of various problems related to the gearbox, an aspect that had already caused him some discomfort while driving last season, and of a slight understeer in certain corners, so he intervened by modifying the incidence of the wing and then modifying the setup for the afternoon.
Overall, however, Verstappen believes that the team has not yet found the ideal operating window for the RB20, what the drivers call the “sweet spot”, although it is not very far from there. The work during the night will therefore be fundamental to take a step forward tomorrow, when we will start to get serious.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB20
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
“It wasn't bad, I think we're all close. Someone else is probably already using more powerful mappings in terms of top speed, but we focus on ourselves”, said Verstappen at the end of free practice, underlining how his rivals probably increased the Power Unit's performance already during the second session of free trials.
“Today we encountered some balance issues from front to rear, but nothing particularly big, it's just a matter of finding the best window, particularly here with such rough asphalt. When you find that ideal window, you start to buy a lot of time, so we'll try to find that window for tomorrow.”
Precisely on this point, Verstappen explained that, beyond the fact that others have used more aggressive mappings, he expects that, at least on the flying lap, the group will be quite compact: “Not everyone did so [alzare le mappature della Power Unit], but some definitely do. I'm not worried about the gap to first place, but we will all be close in qualifying, it will be fun. On the long run I was happy, but there are still a couple of things we can do better.”
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB20
Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images
More encouraging and clear information came, however, from the race simulation concluded with the soft in the last part of free practice, where he was the only one to consistently lap under the pace of one minute and 37 minutes: clearly it is difficult to know the fuel loads used, although in past years Red Bull rarely ran slower than the others, but the references are extremely positive, both in terms of degradation and from the point of view of the chronometer.
A confirmation of what had already been seen in the long runs during the tests, where Verstappen had confirmed himself to be particularly fast and convincing: “We are not far from that window, it's just a matter of hitting it. I felt a little more comfortable with the car, but at the end of the day you also want to focus on the long runs, where the car has to work well. Clearly qualifying is important, but we need to make sure the car is in a good window for the race,” the Dutchman added.
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