Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies says it is not definite that Max Verstappen will take an engine penalty this season, with Red Bull still investigating the cause of his qualifying issues.
Verstappen suffered an engine issue during Friday’s qualifying session at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, which hampered the Red Bull driver’s efforts as he finished Q3 down in eighth place.
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Setting the pace in Friday’s final practice, where he appeared to be the only driver capable of taking the fight to George Russell, Verstappen was 1.555 seconds slower than Russell’s pole position lap in Q3.
“In Q1, we immediately saw a problem,” Verstappen told the Dutch media.
“Of course, at that point you still think, ‘What could it be? Is the engine too cold or actually too hot?’ All of that is possible, because it is all very sensitive nowadays.
“But later it became clear that we really did have a problem with the ICE. It only got worse, and in Q3 that engine was no longer working properly at all.”
Red Bull made the decision to fit Verstappen’s RB22 with a new ICE ahead of Saturday’s Grand Prix. He also took a new turbocharger, power unit auxiliary component and an exhaust.
He was not penalised as all the components were within his season’s allocation. However, the four-time world champion said it is only a matter of time before he takes a power unit penalty.
“Yeah, there definitely has to be a penalty at some point,” he admitted.
Mekies, though, says that’s not guaranteed.
Red Bull Powertrains has yet to examine the engine that Verstappen ran in qualifying to see whether it can be salvaged.
“The real answer is that is not clear yet,” the Red Bull team principal told PlanetF1.com and other accredited media.
“It will very much depend on our analysis of the issues we had with his engine [in qualifying], which we had to take off the car, and whether or not we can use that engine again.
“Based on that, we will see if we can make it to the end with his number four engine.”
Mekies revealed that two separate issues with Verstappen’s power unit cost him in qualifying.
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“We had two different issues with the power unit, and it cost us a lot, but that’s what it is. That’s part of the game,” he said.
“In fairness, Max was very, very strong from Friday onwards, and probably would have been fighting for that first row without the issues we had with the PU.
“Of course, fixing that with the new engine allowed us to get back to the competitive level that we were hoping to have.”
With his RB22 fitted with a new power unit for the Grand Prix, Verstappen raced from eighth on the grid to second at the chequered flag. The Dutchman was just 0.196 seconds behind race winner Russell.
Verstappen is sixth in the Drivers’ Championship on 163 points, 139 behind championship leader Kimi Antonelli.
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Originally published by Planet F1 —
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