Red Bull has been forced to confront an uncomfortable reality after the Dutch Grand Prix, with team boss Laurent Mekies conceding that the team has lost ground relative to its rivals since Formula 1’s summer break.
The warning signs were difficult to miss at Zandvoort. Max Verstappen was unable to match the pace of Mercedes, McLaren and Ferrari over the course of the weekend before his race ended in a first-lap crash, while Liam Lawson could do little more than salvage seventh place.
The Red Bull super-sub finished more than 30 seconds behind McLaren’s Oscar Piastri in sixth place and was the last driver on the lead lap.
For a team that had looked increasingly competitive before the shutdown, the performance represented a significant reality check.
"Performance-wise, there is nowhere to hide. It was a very difficult weekend," acknowledged Mekies.
Red Bull facing a difficult reset
Mekies admitted that Red Bull is still trying to establish whether Zandvoort exposed a genuine regression in its own car or simply demonstrated how effectively its rivals have developed during the break.
"It seems like we have made a bit of a step back compared to where we were before the summer break,” said the Frenchman.
"Of course, we'll never know what the real pace of the car in the race would have been with Max, but it's fair to say that session after session, it looked more difficult than it was in Budapest or in Spa or in Austria.
“So some tough work for us to do to regroup and to see if it is simply the competition that has done a better job than us at upgrading the car, or if something has been limiting us more than it should have been in Zandvoort.
"So that will be for us the next two weeks before we fight back in Monza all together."
©Red Bull
The timing leaves Red Bull with little room for complacency. Monza should offer some encouragement, particularly with an expected power unit change and a grid penalty for Antonelli potentially affecting the competitive order.
But the Italian circuit’s long straights and easier overtaking opportunities could also make it harder for Red Bull to turn any advantage at the start into a decisive race result.
And Verstappen’s absence from the fight at Zandvoort did indeed make the picture even harder to judge. His opening-lap crash denied Red Bull the chance to measure its race pace with its leading driver, leaving Lawson to carry the team’s hopes on his own.
For Mekies, however, the immediate priority was considerably more straightforward.
"The most important thing is that Max is okay. It was a pretty big shunt, and we are all glad to see that he's out of the car, unharmed, and that's what matters the most,” he said.
Red Bull now has two weeks to find out whether Zandvoort was merely an isolated setback — or evidence that the pack has finally begun to leave it behind.
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