Max Verstappen cautions that if Red Bull’s poor performance persists, F1 titles could go.

Max Verstappen cautions that if Red Bull’s poor performance persists F1 titles could go.

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MONZA, Italy — Max Verstappen fears it is “not realistic” for Red Bull to win the Formula One world championships in 2024 if the team cannot find an answer to the recent struggles with its car.

Verstappen, who won 19 out of 22 races in 2023 en route to his third world championship,  slumped to a lowly sixth-place finish in the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, extending his winless run to six races. Teammate Sergio Pérez finished one place behind in seventh.

The result allowed Lando Norris to cut Verstappen’s advantage at the top of the drivers’ standings to 62 points, while McLaren’s double-podium finish brought it to within eight points of Red Bull in the constructors’ championship.

“At the moment, both championships are not realistic,” Verstappen said post-race at Monza on Sunday.

It’s a dramatic reversal in fortunes for Red Bull since the early part of the 2024 season when Verstappen won the first races by an average of 15 seconds. Nine races ago, Red Bull was over 100 points ahead of McLaren, while Verstappen was 84 points clear of Norris as recently as the British Grand Prix

But now Verstappen fears that it could lose both championships unless Red Bull can adjust its car to undo its recent dip in performance.

“It’s up to the team to come with lot of changes with the car, because we basically went from a very dominant car to an undrivable car in the space of, what, six to eight months?” Verstappen said, admitting it was “very weird” for him to experience.

The Red Bull RB20’s issues have sapped Verstappen’s confidence when behind the wheel. He described a “massive balance problem” that exists over a single lap and longer race stints.

“We haven’t got a connection between front and rear,” explained Red Bull team principal Christian Horner. “Max can’t lean on the rear on the way into the corner – or Checo – and they end up compensating for that, creating understeer.”

Horner emphasized the urgency of the situation, stating that both championships “absolutely will be under pressure” if Red Bull continues to perform as it did at Monza. He stressed the need to “turn the situation around very quickly.”