Verstappen profits off McLaren's disastrous day but laments lack of pace
14:03, 16 Jun
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Max Verstappen said that he "never really felt the pace do anything" at the Canadian Grand Prix, despite having the opportunity to capitalise on McLaren.
The papaya-coloured team have dominated the 2025 season so far, but around the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, the pace was not there for them. Both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri then collided on the final few laps to bring a premature end to the Brit's Grand Prix, while Piastri could only finish in P4.
Despite finishing ahead of championship leader Piastri, for the majority of the Grand Prix, Verstappen could not make anything happen, even with George Russell in sight, meaning the chance for victory was beyond the Red Bull Racing driver, settling for a P2 finish.
"No. Not really, to be honest," was the answer from Verstappen when asked if a win was ever possible in Montreal, in his mind.
"The first two stints, I was struggling a lot with the tyres. Just too much degradation again. So we drove quite a defensive race, to be honest, because basically two times, Kimi was about to overtake me, and we boxed. So that worked out quite well for me."
"We did a very aggressive strategy. I think at the last pit stop, I was a bit worried if I was going to make it to the end competitively because on the hard tyre in the second stint, I was already struggling as well. So I think just a lighter fuel load helped a bit."
Max Verstappen took his fifth podium of the 2025 season with his P2 finish at the Canadian Grand Prix
However, even though the gap between Verstappen and Russell was close, nothing could be done by the Dutchman: "I never really felt like I had the pace to do anything. It was more about just looking in the mirror, trying to maintain that gap, trying to look after my tyres to not overstress them. It was not the easiest race, but I think as a team we managed it well"
"I think we definitely optimised everything we could because, honestly, throughout the whole race, I never really felt like I was actually holding on to second. So, yeah, we did a good job. I mean, the whole weekend, I think the car was reasonable. Strategy-wise, we did the best we could."
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With the final result, Verstappen closed in on Piastri and Norris in the world championship standings due to their collision.
Along with that, there was a lot of confidence from Verstappen himself about the feeling with his RB21, with some positive trends occurring: "Well, I hope that we can start every weekend like this in terms of how I feel with the car.
Max Verstappen kept himself out of trouble, unlike Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, making sure the threat of a penalty point and a race ban was nullified
"But overall, we do need more performance to be quick everywhere. I also think that this weekend was a bit, I won't say an off weekend, but McLaren wasn't as strong as normal. And, of course, we benefited a little bit."
"But if we go to all the other tracks now coming up, we definitely need more performance to even be close to them. This has been a good weekend for us, but we need a lot more to be able to fight with them for the whole season," concluded Verstappen.
This article was written in collaboration with Ludo van Denderen
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