ENORMOUS Red Bull change could wreck plan for Verstappen future

One year ago, when Max Verstappen won his third consecutive Formula 1 world championship, he and his Red Bull team were operating with a relentless synergy that seemed indestructible.

Having poached his maiden title on the final lap of the controversial 2021 season finale in Abu Dhabi, Verstappen and Red Bull held off an early challenge from Ferrari in 2022 before retaining the crown at a canter, and followed it up with a third success in 2023 in which they became the most dominant driver-team pairing in the more than seven-decade history of F1.

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Verstappen won 19 races last year, and team-mate Sergio Perez took victory on two other occasions, meaning Red Bull won an astonishing 21 out of 22 grands prix.

Verstappen was driving at the very peak of his powers, Red Bull had delivered him machinery which was several classes above the rest of the field, and the imperious combination of the two showed no sign of slowing down.

The first seven races of the 2024 campaign followed a similar trend – Verstappen and Red Bull built up seemingly unassailable leads in both championships before spring had even turned to summer.

But a few months later and things are very different. The RB20 is now regularly the fourth-fastest car on the grid, McLaren have taken the lead in the constructors’ championship, Verstappen faces a genuine title challenge for the drivers’ title from Lando Norris, and an exodus of key staff members is continuing.

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Where do Max Verstappen and Red Bull stand?

In the short term, the focus of both Verstappen and the wider Red Bull team will be on maximising their results in the final six race weekends in order to see off Norris and retain the drivers’ title for a fourth time.

The 52-point lead Verstappen still holds over Norris - aided by the bafflingly long amount of time McLaren took to prioritise the Brit’s results over team-mate Oscar Piastri - is healthy, but not impregnable. Given there are six grands prix remaining, plus three sprint races, Norris could steadily chip away at the gap if McLaren maintain the speed advantage they have possessed in recent months.

Red Bull have appeared unable to arrest their slide towards the midfield. The team has reverted to previous configurations of elements like the floor design, but the fundamental issues with the car’s overall performance seem difficult to solve. If that trend continues, the end of the season is about damage limitation.

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But whether Verstappen is able to hold onto the title or not, the enormous change in the team’s level of performance, the sweeping changes to senior hierarchy within the team, and the uncertainty of F1’s new era could significantly compromise his future with the team.

The Dutchman is currently tied down to a contract until the end of the 2028 campaign, covering the first three seasons of F1’s new generation of technical regulations which begin in 2026 and will bring about some of the most comprehensive changes to car and engine design in history.

No F1 contract is watertight – exit clauses based on things like weakening performance are always included, and consistent reports throughout the summer indicate Verstappen could potentially engineer a way out of Red Bull sooner than 2028 if he wishes.

When Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff said earlier this year he would keep an “open dialogue” with Verstappen and his father Jos over a potential switch to the Silver Arrows in future, he was simultaneously aiming to sew division at Red Bull and make clear that there is a genuine possibility a deal could be done.

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Would Verstappen really leave Red Bull?

Big-spending Aston Martin - who have already signed the chief Red Bull designer who masterminded Verstappen’s title-winning machinery, Adrian Newey – have also been linked with a potential approach for the 27-year-old.

But would Verstappen really countenance a departure from the team with which he has won three titles?

They key is that, certainly by the time 2026 rolls around, Verstappen may no longer consider Red Bull to be the same team at all. Newey and sporting director Jonathan Wheatley (who is joining Audi’s new F1 project) will be gone, the team could be off the pace of their rivals at the front of the grid if the trend of the past few months are anything to go by, and the prospect of Red Bull developing their own power units for the first time could be seen as less of a sure thing than those produced by established manufacturers like Mercedes and Honda.

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It is possible, of course, that Red Bull replaced the departed personnel strongly, turn around their wayward form, and are able to demonstrate that their power unit project is going swimmingly, in turn convincing Verstappen that he need not consider moving anywhere else.

But the fact that the idea of Verstappen racing elsewhere now seems to be a live prospect, given the fact that Red Bull were in the strongest position of any F1 team in history 365 days ago, is a testament to both how quickly things can change in elite-level motorsport and how badly Red Bull have dropped the ball over the course of 2024.

Over the course of the next few months then, fans will find out not just whether Verstappen will become only the sixth driver to win four F1 world championships, but also plenty about whether his once rock-solid marriage with Red Bull is likely to end happily ever after or with an acrimonious divorce.

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