Max Verstappen’s first pole position and victory of the 2026 season at Sepang may be the clearest evidence yet of how far Red Bull has developed the RB22. A car that began the new Formula 1 era well behind the leading benchmarks has been developed almost continuously and has now reached a point where it appears capable of fighting regularly at the front.
The Bahrain Grand Prix victory in Malaysia carries even greater significance when viewed against Red Bull’s season as a whole. During winter testing, Pierre Waché had placed the team behind Mercedes, McLaren and Ferrari, while Laurent Mekies later estimated that the RB22 had begun the championship more than a second away from the leading pace.
Red Bull cut huge RB22 deficit through major upgrade steps
The first major development package arrived in Miami, just one weekend after Red Bull had introduced revised sidepods for Max Verstappen at Suzuka.
The Miami package already allowed Red Bull to halve its estimated deficit, reducing it to roughly half a second. Further developments introduced in Austria then brought Verstappen to within the final tenth of the leading reference, according to Red Bull’s own assessment.
The progression has therefore been substantial. Instead of relying on one decisive update, Red Bull has evolved the RB22 through several major technical steps, gradually improving both its outright performance and the consistency with which that performance can be accessed.
Sepang delivers first Red Bull Powertrains-Ford Formula 1 victory
Verstappen’s Sepang success also represents an important milestone for the power-unit project. The victory in Malaysia is the first Formula 1 win for Red Bull Powertrains-Ford, arriving during a weekend in which the complete RB22 package showed a more convincing level of competitiveness than at previous events.
The achievement is particularly significant because 2026 is Red Bull Powertrains’ first season as the manufacturer of a complete Formula 1 power unit.
Within the ADUO performance picture among the engine manufacturers, RBPT had immediately been placed among the competitive benchmarks rather than among those expected to spend the season recovering lost ground.
For an organisation experiencing its first direct campaign designing and producing a complete Formula 1 engine, victory represents an important achievement. Verstappen’s win was the major result that had still been missing from an RB22 project that began the season with numerous difficulties.
RB22 has changed dramatically through the 2026 season
The RB22 is probably one of the cars that has changed most extensively over the course of the championship.
In Miami, Red Bull worked on practically every major aerodynamic area: the front wing, brake ducts, floor, sidepods, engine cover, diffuser and reverse rear wing were all involved in the package.
Changes were also made around the cockpit and steering box in an attempt to improve Verstappen’s feeling with the front end.
One of Red Bull’s main problems was creating a more predictable aerodynamic platform capable of maintaining a consistent balance across different types of corner.
The RB22 had not lacked absolute performance everywhere. At certain circuits it was able to move very close to the leading cars, while at others its balance limitations and particularly narrow operating window returned.
Austria upgrade improved Max Verstappen’s confidence
Austria represented another major stage in Red Bull’s development programme.
A heavily revised floor, combined with sidepods that intelligently exploited the regulations governing curvature radii and a series of further refinements, helped Verstappen regain confidence behind the wheel.
However, that improvement still did not completely eliminate the RB22’s inconsistent behaviour. The car remained sensitive to circuit characteristics and aerodynamic configuration.
Red Bull also abandoned some of the experiments attempted during the development process. An example was the more extreme rear-wing solution used during the first part of the summer, which was later set aside following the events in Austria and Silverstone.
Baku package brought estimated 0.35-second Red Bull gain
Baku brought what is expected to be the RB22’s final major development package before Red Bull shifts its resources fully towards 2027, aside from smaller refinements that arrived at Sepang.
The central element was once again the floor. Red Bull revised the geometry of both the floor body and diffuser with the stated objective of increasing local downforce while also improving airflow stability.
Those changes were combined with another revision to the sidepod shapes, continuing the extensive development work carried out by Pierre Waché’s technical department, together with further refinements to the bodywork.
According to Red Bull’s estimates, the Baku package delivered an overall performance gain of approximately three and a half tenths of a second per lap.
Red Bull appears to have optimised upgrade faster than McLaren and Mercedes
One of the most interesting aspects has been how quickly Red Bull appears to have optimised the package after introducing it.
Compared with McLaren and Mercedes, which introduced upgrade packages of comparable importance, Red Bull appears to have reached an effective operating point much sooner.
The result in Azerbaijan partially disguised the size of the improvement.
Verstappen qualified only eighth after reporting an issue that was costing him around half a second on the straights compared with the sister car. In the race, however, he recovered to second place in a photo finish with George Russell.
More important than the final result was the underlying pace, which suggested that something fundamental had changed in the RB22’s level of competitiveness.
Sepang confirms Red Bull upgrade works beyond Baku
Baku was a highly unusual circuit, dominated by very long straights and a layout that placed particular emphasis on energy management. Sepang therefore represented a much more meaningful test of whether Red Bull’s improvements could work across a broader range of conditions.
The Malaysian circuit provided exactly that verification.
Its fast corners, longer sustained cornering phases and much wider range of speeds allowed Red Bull’s engineers to evaluate the behaviour of the revised floor outside the very specific environment of Baku.
By the end of Friday, Pierre Waché had already admitted that the results were even better than the team had initially expected.
Red Bull believes new floor improved both downforce and stability
The primary objective of the Sepang weekend was to test the Baku development package across different types of corner, and the response was positive.
The Azerbaijan specification appears to have improved not only the overall quantity of downforce available to the RB22, but also the quality with which that load is produced and maintained across different operating conditions.
That distinction is particularly important for a Red Bull car whose biggest weakness earlier in the year was not simply a lack of peak performance, but an inability to reproduce that performance consistently as circuit characteristics changed.
Sepang therefore represents much more than a first victory of the season for Max Verstappen. It suggests that the technical programme that took the RB22 from a deficit of more than one second during the early stages of 2026 to the front of the field has finally begun to deliver a more complete and predictable Formula 1 car.
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