Red Bull downforce recovery "very critical" for competitive 2021 - Max Verstappen

Red Bull

Red Bull downforce recovery "very critical" for competitive 2021 - Verstappen

Dutch driver finished third in last year's championship

Ian Parkes

Wednesday 20 January 2021 05:00

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Max Verstappen has called on Red Bull to recover lost downforce if he is to challenge Mercedes this season.

Last year's RB16 proved to be problematic to understand, primarily as the philosophy regarding the front of the car changed over the course of last winter, leading to what team principal Christian Horner described as "complexities" that "made life difficult".

Yet despite the issues, Red Bull still emerged as the second-best team on the grid to Mercedes, with Verstappen third in the drivers' standings behind Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas.

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With 60 per cent of last year's car carrying over into the RB16B for this year, most of the focus this winter will have been on the aerodynamic side, albeit limited to some degree by the token system restricting development.

Asked by GPFans Global as to his key target for this year, Verstappen replied: “Just with the floor. To recover that downforce will be very critical.

"We will do that in the best way. We will be very competitive. So we will have to look at that.

“I think we learned a lot about last year's car which we will try to rectify for this year, some bits.

"We can’t do everything with the tokens but it’s going to be an important year to perform. Of course, we’re looking already to 2022 and how that is going to go.”

The next few months will prove difficult for all teams as they determine the resources to be spent on this season's car weighed up against the major regulation change for next year.

Verstappen is simply keeping fingers crossed the design gurus throughout F1 unlock the secrets to closer racing.

“It’s down to the engineers, to the designers to come up with the fastest car they can think of and design," added Verstappen. “It’s going to be very different but let’s hope for the best.

“I just hope it’s better for racing to be honest. That’s all we need because the cars we have now, they are really tricky to follow.

“Of course, we’ve had some entertaining races but I think it can only get better with cars that are better to follow.”