Max Verstappen Raises Alarm Bells Over Red Bull’s Race Pace Despite Dominance in FP2
In a stunning twist at the 2025 Mexico City Grand Prix, Max Verstappen, the reigning world champion, has thrown down the gauntlet, warning that Red Bull’s race pace is far from solid, despite finishing on top of the timesheets in Free Practice 2. While Verstappen’s blistering lap time of 1:17.392 placed him 0.153 seconds ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, a closer look reveals a troubling undercurrent that could spell disaster for the iconic team as they gear up for the race.
After sitting out the opening session for Red Bull junior Arvid Lindblad, Verstappen wasted no time in asserting his dominance during FP2. However, his initial excitement quickly turned to caution as he voiced serious concerns about the car’s performance over longer runs. “The short run on the soft, we managed to do a good lap,” Verstappen remarked. “The rest, everything else was pretty bad. The medium short run was not great, and the big problem is the long runs, where we seem to struggle a lot. So that is, of course, a big concern for the race.”
Despite his impressive one-lap speed, the Dutch driver expressed frustration over the car’s handling during long-run simulations, revealing a stark reality. “I don’t know yet what’s going on,” he confessed, highlighting a lack of grip that left him feeling uneasy. “As soon as you go on a sustainable run, the tyres are going hot, and we were nowhere. That’s a tough one to sort out.” The situation escalated as Verstappen bluntly described his experience on team radio, stating, “It’s terrible, I have no grip; it’s like driving on ice.”
This alarming feedback was echoed in Red Bull’s telemetry data. The car’s performance on medium tyres deteriorated rapidly after just a few laps, raising red flags about its ability to compete at the highest level. The challenges posed by Mexico City’s high altitude—known for putting extra strain on tyres and cooling systems—seemed to exacerbate Red Bull’s struggles, with their rubber overheating significantly faster than that of rivals like McLaren and Ferrari.
Despite leading the session, Verstappen was quick to dismiss any notion that their qualifying pace would translate into a race victory. “You’re not going to win the race like that,” he asserted. “You can be fast over one lap, but if you have absolutely zero pace in the race, then it’s going to be very tough. I prefer to be fast in the race and not so fast over one lap.”
Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko echoed Verstappen’s sentiments, confirming that grip issues were apparent across both cars. “We saw this sort of non-grip – it was like ice,” he stated, adding that Verstappen’s car had been “quite a bit sideways.” Marko acknowledged the competitive edge of McLaren, particularly in long-run consistency, which left Red Bull vulnerable. “For qualifying heat, we were competitive,” he noted, but he couldn’t ignore the reality that “the way Norris was going, he’s just pulling away.”
As the tension mounts ahead of the race, Marko found a sliver of hope in the performance disparity between McLaren drivers, noting that Lando Norris appeared significantly quicker than his teammate, Oscar Piastri, who languished in 12th place during FP2.
With the championship title race tightening, Verstappen’s candid assessment of Red Bull’s struggles has set the stage for a thrilling weekend. If the team can crack the code on their tyre management issues before qualifying, the Dutch star could transform his early speed into a resounding victory. However, as it stands, the man in pursuit of his fifth world title finds himself in an unsettling predicament. Will Red Bull rise to the occasion, or has Verstappen’s alarm bell sounded the death knell for their championship aspirations? Only time will tell as the engines roar at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.












