Red Bull has delivered perhaps its most alarming assessment yet of the RB22, with technical director Pierre Wache admitting the team currently has “no confidence” in a car that appears to reveal a new weakness every time it leaves the garage.
For an outfit that once defined Formula 1 dominance, the statement lands like a warning siren.
The first half of the 2026 season has passed without a single victory for Red Bull. The slump follows a painful near-miss in the 2024 drivers’ championship and a losing 2025 campaign to McLaren, but the real concern now seems deeper than outright pace.
According to Wache, the RB22 has become unpredictable, hypersensitive to changing conditions and frighteningly difficult to understand.
“We fought until the end, and like the other team, McLaren, I think we are a little bit behind, both of us, based on what we did last year,” Wache admitted.
That in itself would be notable. What came next was far more troubling.
“The other competitors have improved a lot since Monaco. With this new car, you see a different problem every time you go to the track, when you put the car on the ground. We try to maximise it, but no confidence,” the Frenchman added.
Those four words – “but no confidence” – may be the clearest indication yet that Red Bull no longer trusts its own machine.
The evidence has been visible in public. Max Verstappen spun in qualifying in both Austria and Hungary, with the Austrian crash ending in the gravel after contact with the barriers.
The four-time world champion and team-mate Isack Hadjar have also spoken of feeling the car physically coming apart beneath them during sessions, raising uncomfortable questions about its structural behaviour.
Wache insisted the team has not stood still and praised the effort being made behind the scenes.
“I think the main aspect is that we started behind and, for sure, we have progressed,” he explained.
“I think it’s a very good job from the team to progress and to arrive where we are.
“We still aren’t where we would like to be, but you try to do your best, try to understand what is not working and what you can do better, and after that you see where you are. But the main thing is that the progress was interesting as a team.”
The striking aspect of those comments is not the optimism but the uncertainty.
Red Bull appears to be developing the RB22 while simultaneously trying to discover what the car fundamentally is. Every circuit, every weather shift and every setup change seems capable of exposing a fresh flaw.
That is a dangerous place for any Formula 1 team to be, particularly one built around Verstappen’s relentless pursuit of championships.
The timing could hardly be worse. Formula 1 returns at Zandvoort, Verstappen’s home race, where expectations will be intense and scrutiny even greater.
The Dutchman’s long-term future remains one of the paddock’s dominant talking points, and a car that inspires “no confidence” does little to quiet the speculation.
Red Bull once entered weekends expecting to win. It now enters them expecting surprises – and not the pleasant kind.
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