Qualifying showed the Baku upgrade is working
Red Bull arrived in Austin with two stated aims: better low-speed performance and better car behaviour over the bumps. Verstappen was satisfied with the start of the weekend, according to [1], but he did not hide his view of the surface, calling the bumps “unacceptable” and “out of control”. The team set out to fine-tune balance and compliance before qualifying.
The work paid off on Saturday. Verstappen qualified second, and Red Bull took second and third on the grid, which [2] read as a sign of how far the team has come since the Baku upgrade. The report argues that Red Bull no longer falls off the pace on difficult days.
It was not a perfect session. Verstappen was puzzled by a loss of grip in Q3, and gusts of wind affected driver performance in the final segment. He still expressed confidence in the car’s race pace, though the start remained a question mark. That caveat proved relevant on Sunday.
Race day: a podium with plenty of complaints
Kimi Antonelli won the United States Grand Prix from pole for Mercedes, his ninth victory of 2026, ahead of Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen, [3] reported. Verstappen’s third place came after a second pit stop forced by engine braking issues, which he described as leaving the car undriveable. Isack Hadjar finished sixth and Liam Lawson ninth.
From the cockpit, the picture was less comfortable than the result suggests. Verstappen reported inconsistent power unit behaviour through corners and a slow pit stop, and said the softer-compound tyre strategy backfired, according to [4]. Poor starts, which have troubled the team all season, were raised again.
For a team that qualified on the front two rows, losing ground to a pit stop caused by a technical fault is costly. Mercedes had a clear run at the win, and Russell, who took a five-second penalty and finished eighth, was the only notable Mercedes setback on the day.
Communication is the problem Red Bull cannot seem to fix
The most striking item from the weekend was not on the timing sheets. Red Bull’s radio communication problems recurred in Austin, and both Verstappen and Hadjar had trouble with the team. Verstappen could not hear stand-in race engineer Tom Hart, which the same [4] report presents as one of two recurring problems, alongside the starts.
Radio matters most when strategy is being adjusted in real time. With a softer-tyre plan going wrong and a power unit behaving unpredictably, clear instructions between driver and pit wall are essential. A fault that affects two drivers in the same race suggests the issue is more than a one-off glitch on a single car.
The positives still stand. A car that can run second and third in qualifying and bring home a podium and a sixth place despite a litany of problems has real underlying pace. The facts supplied do not say whether the bump behaviour improved in the race, so the first of Red Bull’s two focus areas remains unresolved on the evidence available. Low-speed performance, the other focus, produced a front-row grid slot, which is encouraging.
What it means
Red Bull sit fourth in the Formula 1 World Championship with 352 points from 18 rounds played, and the records list two wins. That is a respectable position, but the gap to Mercedes is visible: Antonelli has nine wins this season and can clinch the title at the Mexico Grand Prix with two more points.
The form line from Austin reads as a team with speed and avoidable losses. A second-place qualifying and a third-place finish say the car is competitive. Slow stops, shaky starts, radio faults and power unit inconsistency say the team is leaving points on the table. Each of those is operational or reliability-related rather than a pure lack of pace, which makes them fixable.
The next race, Mexico, will ask a simple question: can Red Bull convert qualifying pace into clean Sundays? The records here carry no forecast for that round, so there is no model call to quote. The test is whether communication holds, the pit crew executes and the power unit behaves, because the pace is already there to fight for podiums.
Sources
- Autosport: Red Bull identifies two "key focus" areas after Max Verstappen's promising start in Austin motorsport.com ↩
- Autosport: Red Bull no longer falls away on difficult days: What Austin qualifying reveals about its progress motorsport.com ↩
- Autosport: F1 United States GP: Antonelli dominates from pole - but forced to wait for title autosport.com ↩
- Autosport: The two recurring issues that hampered Verstappen and Red Bull again at the US GP motorsport.com ↩