SÃO PAULO — Max Verstappen gave a clear assessment of the status of his outsider bid for the Formula 1 title after a difficult Saturday in Brazil: “Forget about it.”
Verstappen failed to make it out of Q1 in qualifying for the first time since the 2021 Russian Grand Prix and it was the first time in his career that he was eliminated from Q1 for car pace.
He had already slipped to 39 points behind championship leader Lando Norris after finishing fourth in the sprint on Saturday morning.
His already slim title hopes appear to be on thin ice.
“You can forget about that, yes, for sure,” Verstappen said when asked where he now stands in that fight.
When asked if he meant he has absolutely no chance now, he said: “Yeah … where we are starting, so, that’s not going to work, and with these kind of performances I mean forget about it.”
Max Verstappen was knocked out in Q1 in Brazil. Getty
Verstappen and Red Bull now look set to take advantage of the F1 rule book and make wholesale changes to the car and start from the pits rather than the grid.
In the hours after qualifying Red Bull’s car was being worked on in the garage — it is understood a new engine and new floor are being fitted to the car.
That would mean a start from the pit-lane on Sunday.
While it effectively means starting last, it means Verstappen will avoid Turn 1 and contest the race with a fresh engine.
Brazil had appeared to be a chance for Verstappen to have cut the gap to the McLarens but he has struggled with the handling of his Red Bull from the minute track action started on Friday.
The four-time world champion’s radio messages revealed a frustrated and irritated Verstappen struggling for grip with his car, which had several weeks ago appeared to have become the quickest on the grid after victories in Monza, Azerbaijan, and Austin, as well as a second position in Singapore.
“For sure, definitely something is off and we don’t understand how to fix it at the moment,” he said.
“We need to understand what our problems are first of all. just not been good, it seems we don’t really understand why it’s going that way.
“Nothing seems to work, we changed a lot on the car, we just don’t understand.
Brazilian Grand Prix qualifying top 10
Lando Norris enjoyed a dream Saturday in São Paulo. He won the sprint race and then followed it up a few hours later by clinching pole.
DriverTeamTimes1 – Lando NorrisMcLaren1:09.5112 – Kimi AntonelliMercedes+0.1743 – Charles LeclercFerrari+0.2944 – Oscar PiastriMcLaren+0.3755 – Isack HadjarRB+0.4206 – George RussellMercedes+0.4317 – Liam LawsonRB+0.4518 – Oliver BearmanHaas+0.4669 – Pierre GaslyAlpine+0.49110 – Nico HulkenbergSauber+0.528
“Something is just clearly not working for us, usually with the changes of the set-up normally you’d feel some kind of reaction but it doesn’t, so, yeah, something is just really off.”
Verstappen claimed a famous win at the Interlagos circuit 12 months ago after qualifying 17th, a result which basically secured his fourth world championship.
Heavy rain had been a factor in his turnaround that day, with Verstappen arguably F1’s premier driver in wet conditions, but that weather is not forecast for Sunday.
“I don’t know [what’s possible], there’s so many things we need to get right, overnight, to try something or understand something,” he added.
