Hadjar brands Red Bull starts 'shocking' as Verstappen admits team is simply too slow at Silverstone

Isack Hadjar publicly condemned Red Bull’s chronic start problems as “shocking” following Saturday’s sprint race at Silverstone, where both he and Max Verstappen lost ground off the line for the umpteenth time this season. Verstappen recovered to third before being overtaken by Lando Norris, George Russell and Charles Leclerc, ultimately finishing fifth.

Hadjar made his feelings clear immediately over team radio, telling the pit wall: “Those starts, it’s the same story now, it’s just annoying, guys. I know it’s going to be my fault again, I bet so.” When engineers told him Red Bull was still working on a solution — including simplifying the launch procedure — the Frenchman was unimpressed. “Everyone does it, everyone, except us,” he replied.

Speaking to media afterwards, Hadjar’s frustration had not softened. “We can’t get starts. We just don’t understand it,” he said. “There is no point going to a race if you know you’re going to lose four places straight away. In my case, I lost even more than that. It’s shocking, all the time.”

Hadjar also noted that sister team Racing Bulls has not suffered the same difficulties, adding an uncomfortable dimension to Red Bull’s predicament. “Last year, out of 24 starts, I had 24 good starts,” he said. “Now with these new regulations and the engine, we seem not to understand it. But the thing is that Racing Bulls is doing a way better job than us, so it’s a bit weird.”

Verstappen, meanwhile, attributed his own poor launch to wheelspin rather than a mechanical issue with the power unit. “I dropped the clutch and then you have to wait for grip. That was not ideal, but after that I got myself back into a decent, well, at least normal position,” he said.

The bigger concern for Verstappen, however, was Red Bull’s underlying lack of pace at Silverstone — a problem that persisted despite the significant upgrade package introduced at the previous round in Austria. “You can clearly see that we are just too slow,” he said. “Too slow in slow-speed corners, too slow in high-speed corners and more tyre degradation than the others.”

The double setback — poor starts compounded by a pace deficit — leaves Red Bull facing pointed questions ahead of Sunday’s British Grand Prix, with Verstappen having predicted before the sprint that he would spend much of the race watching rivals in his mirrors. That forecast proved accurate.