Did Verstappen show a weakness of Red Bull?

By Joe Murphy

Max Verstappen had claimed two wins from two prior to the most recent Australian Grand Prix. He very clearly had the pace, as did his teammate, who made the start of the season a perfect one for the constructor.

However, a premature retirement that handed Carlos Sainz and Ferrari their first win of the campaign does show a vulnerability of the Dutchman’s car. Formwise, nobody can touch the current World Champion. However, the breaks over-heating as they did and the car coming to an abrupt stop shows that they may not have it all their own way this season.

Furthermore, this issue was something that Sergio Perez started to fear was going to happen to him, so the worry considerably impacted on the Mexican’s race too.

Whilst it is true that cars having problems is par for the course when it comes to Formula 1, all eyes will be on Japan to see if both team and driver can recover and get back to winning ways. Or, will the problem persist and open the door for more criticism of this model? Just over a week until we find out.