Max Verstappen admits P3 in Barcelona qualifying reflects true pace behind dominant McLarens | Spanish GP. Max Verstappen acknowledged that third place in qualifying at the Spanish GP reflects Red Bull's current pace.

After finishing qualifying as the closest challenger to the McLarens, the driver spoke very realistically, saying that third place was the best he could aim for today and that it will be very difficult to beat the papaya duo in tomorrow’s race.

This time, Max Verstappen was not able to work his magic. In Barcelona, the McLarens confirmed their supremacy in qualifying as well, just as they had shown throughout the Spanish Grand Prix weekend. However, this did not seem to surprise the four-time world champion, who, with the third-best time behind the two papayas Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, believes he extracted all the potential from his Red Bull.

In fact, with a gap of just 93 thousandths from the front row, the Dutch driver even limited the damage, although it must be said he was somewhat lucky. It’s hard to ignore that he and George Russell, with whom he will share the second row, posted exactly the same time to the thousandth. However, Verstappen will start third because his 1’11″848 was set a few moments before Russell’s.

“I think that’s the best we can do. We lacked pace throughout the weekend compared to the McLarens, so I think we performed the best we could in qualifying. Third place is more or less what we deserve, although those behind us are quite close. It’s always nice to set a time here, squeezing all the potential from the car, even though the track was quite ‘green’ despite the high temperature. Now we’ll see what we can do tomorrow,” he said shortly after arriving for the routine interviews in parc fermé.

When asked how much he had to work with the Milton Keynes team to set up an RB21 that didn’t seem quite right, he added: “Not much. Actually, our weekend was decent. We made some last-minute changes to the car, but unfortunately, they weren’t enough to fight for pole.”

Looking ahead to tomorrow’s race, Max sounded very realistic, not hiding that beating the MCL39s currently seems very difficult. Knowing him, though, this doesn’t mean he won’t try: “I’ll do my best, but the McLarens will be tough to beat. We’ll see what we can do.”