Toward an engine penalty for Verstappen in Brazil

This is a championship that is far from over. While the United States Grand Prix had allowed Verstappen to extend his lead in the championship even further, the race in Mexico shuffled the cards, with Norris gaining 10 points on the Dutchman at the end of the race. Apart from the result obtained, it is especially the performance that worried Red Bull. Helmut Marko, advisor within the Austrian structure, explained that the car simply did not have the pace to compete at the front. It was unfortunately very disappointing. We were not particularly competitive with both types of tires, and tire wear was also higher than that of our competitors. We were not close to Ferrari in terms of speed, neither with the medium tires nor with the hard tires. And if you look at Norris’s lap times, especially towards the end, it was incredible and out of reach for us.

An aging engine mounted on Verstappen’s car

The Austrian may have an explanation to justify this underperformance: Verstappen’s engine. And it may be partly due to the fact that we couldn’t drive on Friday because of Max’s engine issues, but still. The Dutchman had not driven much during the free practice sessions, completing only four laps during the second session due to a leak in the intake air circuit that could not be fully resolved. To avoid a penalty in Mexico, Red Bull decided to introduce an old engine on the car of the triple world champion. However, it was a worn power unit, leaving Verstappen with a power deficit on the straights, the native of Hasselt being 2 km/h slower than his teammate before the activation of the DRS in the starting straight (251.4 km/h compared to 253.4 km/h for Perez).

Towards a new engine penalty for the Dutch?

Faced with Verstappen’s discontent, the Milton Keynes team is considering installing a new engine for the Dutchman at Interlagos. A choice that would force him to move back five places on the starting grid. « The engine we had for the Mexican GP was no longer planned for the race. And the older an engine gets, the more its performance decreases. The penalty would be five places, which would not be so severe in Brazil, for example, where it is relatively easy to overtake. But we noticed a lack of between 3 and 8 km/h on the straight lines », Helmut Marko revealed to the Austrian channel ORF. Indeed, according to the data, Verstappen was the second slowest in the first intermediate sector, recording 299.6 km/h compared to 303.1 for Perez and 307.9 km/h for his rival Lando Norris.

A severe lack of top speed that could cost Verstappen and Red Bull valuable points in the final races like in Las Vegas or Qatar, where engine power is crucial. « We need to do something about it, that’s for sure. We will also have to change the engine because we were so slow on the straights. This engine that was in the car wasn’t supposed to be there, so it’s very likely to happen in Brazil. »

An increasingly tight championship

If this penalty is confirmed, it will be a new opportunity for Norris to recover points on his Dutch rival. The British driver had actually shone last year on this circuit with a pole position in the sprint qualifications before finishing second in the race the next day. Verstappen, on his side, hopes to have the same race as in Belgium where, starting eleventh after receiving a 10-place engine penalty, he finished fourth in the race, ahead of the British driver’s McLaren.

Note that under the FIA regulations, this penalty will only apply during the main race on Sunday, so the former Toro Rosso driver’s prospects for the sprint race remain unchanged. With only a 47-point lead in the standings and a penalty expected to be imposed in Brazil, the driver’s title appears increasingly uncertain and could be decided in the final round in Abu Dhabi.