Max Verstappen struggles in Suzuka FP1 and FP2: “Bad day, no balance or grip”. Max Verstappen admits to a difficult Friday at Suzuka.

Max Verstappen ended Friday at Suzuka with far from positive feelings. The four-time world champion described a challenging day marked by a lack of balance, low grip, and two sessions that revealed different yet equally worrying issues.

“It wasn’t a good day”

When asked about his track performance, Max Verstappen did not look for excuses:

“Yes, not very well, to be honest. We lacked balance and grip; two completely different sessions between FP1 and FP2, and yes, neither went very well. There is a lot of work to do to understand why we are having these kinds of big problems. It wasn’t a good day.”

The picture is clear: Red Bull has not found the ideal operating point, and the car’s behavior changed drastically between the two sessions.

Major changes, different problems

The team attempted interventions between FP1 and FP2 but could not find a convincing direction:

“Yes, you try to correct one thing, and then another issue pops up, but basically, you never manage to find good balance.”

This domino effect made it difficult to interpret the car and understand the right path for the rest of the weekend.

Looking ahead to Saturday

Regarding work for Saturday, Max Verstappen remained realistic:

“Yes, but at the same time, it’s very difficult to solve at the moment, so I don’t expect miracles overnight. We just need to understand our problems a bit better, where they come from.”

The Dutch champion knows that it will be a long night for the engineers at Suzuka, but he does not expect immediate revolutions.

Friday was one of Verstappen’s toughest in recent months: lack of balance, poor grip, and changes that did not bring the expected improvements. Red Bull will have to thoroughly analyze the data to prevent a difficult start from compromising the rest of the weekend.

In summary, Max Verstappen’s Friday was one of his most difficult in recent months, defined by a lack of balance, poor grip, and setup changes that led nowhere. Red Bull will need to deep-dive into the data to prevent this complicated start from compromising their entire 2026 Japanese Grand Prix weekend.