Verstappen reveals Red Bull ignored his set-up advice before Canadian GP qualifying struggle

Max Verstappen qualified sixth for the Canadian Grand Prix after Red Bull chose a car set-up that the four-time world champion had explicitly advised against, with Verstappen conceding he went along with the team’s decision in part to demonstrate it was the wrong call.

Speaking to Dutch media after a qualifying session he described as “very difficult to understand”, Verstappen said he struggled with tyre temperature and a lack of top speed throughout. “Throughout the session I had very little top speed and simply no grip,” he said. “A lot of things from this qualifying session are very difficult to understand. For example, I have no idea where that final lap suddenly came from.”

On the top-speed deficit specifically, Verstappen appeared to derate earlier than most rivals — an issue Red Bull could not explain during the session. “I don’t know. I didn’t get any information from the team either, so it was clear that we couldn’t solve it during the session,” he said.

The more striking revelation concerned the set-up itself. Verstappen made clear that the direction taken on his car was one the team had pushed for against his own judgement. “We did something different with my car, that’s what the team wanted. Clearly, that doesn’t work the way it should. But sometimes you also have to let the team do their thing and make clear that it doesn’t work. I said, ‘Go ahead, if you think this is going to work, then do it.’ And clearly, it doesn’t work.”

What makes the situation unusual is that Verstappen typically holds significant influence over Red Bull’s technical decisions. As a four-time world champion with years of experience at the team, his feedback on set-up direction has historically been treated as close to definitive. “I’ve pointed it out so many times already, but sometimes you just have to let them feel for themselves that it doesn’t work,” he added.

When pressed on why the team had deviated from its usual approach, Verstappen acknowledged it was not a complete breakdown in communication. “Of course they listen to me very often, but not this time, because they were convinced that it was going to work.”

Notably, a different set-up choice was made on teammate Isack Hadjar’s car, suggesting Red Bull used Verstappen’s RB21 as a test case for the new direction — a dynamic Verstappen confirmed has occurred before during his time at the team.