It will not be a night filled with smiles in the Red Bull garage, because the first day of running in Budapest once again revealed the limitations of the RB21 car. As soon as the car moves outside its narrow ideal operating window, it suffers from the usual problems of poor balance and a significant lack of grip. Now, the hope is that the “usual” nighttime miracle will be able to completely turn around the performance of the car.
Without any beating around the bush, this was probably the worst Friday of the Formula 1 season so far for Max Emilian Verstappen, especially during a weekend when he officially confirmed that he will remain with the Red Bull Racing team through the 2026 season. Yet, this first day of track action in Budapest carries the familiar feeling for the Milton Keynes-based team, because it is not the first time that everything seems to go wrong on a Friday.
Looking at the entire 2025 Formula 1 season, it is not uncommon to see Red Bull Racing struggling during the Friday free practice sessions, often facing issues with car balance and lack of grip. However, they usually take a significant step forward overnight by analyzing the extensive data gathered on track. Red Bull has long suffered from a notable difficulty correlating simulator data with actual on-track performance when preparing their setup, which makes the work done overnight after the opening day of the weekend absolutely critical in order to correct issues ahead of qualifying.
Despite the tense and serious faces at the end of the second practice session, the team’s hope remains that, once again, a “nighttime miracle” will allow Max Emilian Verstappen to return to competitive form, at least to fight for a position on the second row of the starting grid, in a context where McLaren, as expected, seems untouchable at this stage. What Friday’s running clearly showed once more is that as soon as the RB21 leaves that narrow ideal window, the “classic” lack of grip problems immediately resurface.
For now, Scuderia Ferrari has taken the role of clear second-best team with relative ease and solid performance, while Mercedes and Red Bull are trailing behind at a distance. However, the threat posed by Max Emilian Verstappen must never be underestimated, even when “nothing seems to be working,” as the Dutch world champion himself explained during interviews at the end of the day.
The reigning world champion described the RB21 as “undrivable,” comparing it to driving “on ice,” which is a rather clear indication of a total lack of mechanical grip. Immediately after the session, Verstappen went directly to the motorhome for a technical debrief with his engineers and team principals in an attempt to understand how to turn things around quickly.
“Today was really tough, with very low grip and no true balance from the car, so it’s difficult to say exactly what the problem is. Nothing seems to be working, so we’ll have to analyze everything overnight. So far, this has not been our weekend,” Max Emilian Verstappen said.
“I am sure we can improve, but today went very badly. First of all, we need to understand where the problem lies and what is causing such a significant deficit. McLaren looks to be in great shape, they are flying, but even just getting close to second place will be a challenge,” he added.
Although it would not be the first time that Red Bull Racing has managed to overturn a difficult Friday, Verstappen made it clear that, at this moment, the team does not yet have a clear explanation for the problems encountered. This means a long night of data analysis is ahead. This theme also emerges from the preliminary reading of the collected data, which highlights all the limitations of an RB21 running outside its ideal condition.
In Budapest, Red Bull introduced a new high-downforce front wing in an attempt to rebalance the car. With the rear end already heavily loaded to meet the demands of the Hungaroring circuit, the risk was that the chronic understeer at the front end, which the RB21 has exhibited throughout much of the season, would be even more pronounced. For this reason, the team tried to intervene on the front end to balance the overall package, but the problems appear to be more widespread.
It is true that much of the performance gap relative to rivals is concentrated in the medium and low-speed sections of the track, as expected given Red Bull’s ongoing difficulties getting the car to rotate properly in slow corners. In contrast, the RB21 shows better performance in the faster parts of the circuit. However, what worries the team is that this gap seems to widen over the entire lap, which is a clear sign of a general lack of mechanical grip. This is the most challenging issue to fix, but also the one that could guarantee the biggest leap forward from one day to the next if the underlying problems are properly understood.
Adding to the complications is a noticeable lack of top speed, partly due to the need to run with higher downforce wings and partly because of more conservative engine mappings to avoid overstressing an already fragile Honda power unit, especially in slower and typically hot conditions like those at the Hungarian Grand Prix.
This is not an unprecedented situation for Red Bull Racing. Recent history has shown that even after difficult days, the team has been able to bounce back by relying on overnight work and its remarkable ability to transform data into tangible performance gains. If there is one team capable of reshuffling the deck when all seems lost, it is definitely Red Bull Racing, aiming to deliver a very different Saturday and produce a strong qualifying lap to bring Max Emilian Verstappen back into Ferrari’s vicinity.
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