Max Verstappen: We are catching up

Max Verstappen qualified third in Hungary and made no secret of his disappointment after the session that Red Bull Racing was currently losing out to McLaren in terms of high lap speed.

The reigning world champion is counting on warmer weather on Sunday to help him battle for top spot.

His teammate Sergio Perez crashed his car in the first part and qualified sixteenth.

Max Verstappen (3rd): “I tried to do everything I could, but all weekend we were a bit behind. This happened again in qualifying. I tried to stay as close as possible to the first position, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough.

It was difficult to keep the same pace as the guys in front because I had no grip.

I’ll start third and hope our car will be fast enough in the race. At least I can keep up with McLaren, so we’ll see what we can do.

I like to fight with opponents, but I would like to win this fight. At the moment we are catching up and we have had several difficult weekends. I will not give up the fight, but we are in a difficult situation.

In the last few laps McLaren was very quick during the race. Today it was cooler than expected, it even rained, but tomorrow it should be warmer again and I hope that will help us.”

Sergio Perez (16th): “Physically I am fine, but I am very disappointed because I had a very strong weekend up until qualifying. It hurts that I let the team down, but I am more determined than ever to get back to winning ways.

Tomorrow is another chance, let’s see what we can do if we start from sixteenth place.

“I have a long race ahead of me. I need to shut out the outside noise and focus on my work. Yesterday I had my best Friday of the season and we have definitely made progress. Unfortunately, the problems are coming one after the other and I need to do something to reverse this trend quickly.”