Red Bull could stay ahead until 2026, fears Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc

ZANDVOORT – Red Bull’s rivals may not be able to catch up with Max Verstappen and his dominant Formula One team until the next rule change in 2026, Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc admitted on Thursday.

The Monegasque was overall runner-up to the Dutch driver last season but since then, Verstappen has won 10 of 12 races and is heading for a record-equalling ninth in a row at his home grand prix on Sunday.

Red Bull are also on an unbeaten run of 13 races dating back to last campaign's Abu Dhabi finale and have triumphed in 21 of the last 22.

“They have a really big margin and it’s going to be very difficult to catch them before the change of regulations (in 2026),” Leclerc said at Zandvoort.

As it stands, he is fifth in the current standings on 99 points, behind Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton (148), Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso (149) and the dominant Red Bull duo of Sergio Perez (189) and Verstappen (314).

The Dutchman made a perfect start on Friday, lapping Zandvoort’s seaside circuit with a best time of 1min 11.852sec on soft tyres in the first practice session.

Alonso was second quickest, 0.278 slower, with Mercedes’ seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton third.

Perez was fourth on the timesheets, 0.471 slower than his teammate, with Williams’ Alex Albon fifth and Lando Norris sixth for McLaren.

Hamilton feared Verstappen might be unbeatable in the remaining 10 races of 2023.

“There is a high chance that he will win every race,” the Briton said. “They might win everything. Hopefully later on in the year, we’ll get closer, maybe.

“The fact is they are far ahead and most likely have started developing next year’s car already... so it’s very, very possible that Charles could be right.”

Hamilton's teammate George Russell said Mercedes, second in the constructors' championship, hoped to be in a position to cash in if Red Bull did slip up, and took hope from past experience.

“I think going into this second half of the season we can be there to hopefully pick up any pieces that fall our way,” he said.

“There were no expectations going into Brazil and we came away with a victory there. So we’ll treat every race as an opportunity.”

Russell's win in Sao Paulo last November in a Mercedes one-two remains the last time anyone other than a Red Bull driver stood on top of the podium.

Ferrari team boss Fred Vasseur, meanwhile, has also urged his drivers to take their chances and improve in all areas, starting with the Dutch Grand Prix this weekend.

The Frenchman admitted that his team, who are fourth in the championship, lacked two or three tenths of performance.

“There is a huge gap with Mercedes in terms of points but also, when I look at the first part of the season, we missed too many opportunities,” said Vasseur, who took over at Maranello in January.

“We have to be much more opportunistic in the second part of the season.

“We need something a bit special if we want to catch up with Mercedes (who are 56 points ahead), but the most important for me is to catch up with Mercedes in terms of pace.”

Vasseur felt that Ferrari, who have no major upgrades planned this weekend, were faster than the Mercedes of Hamilton and Russell on average in qualifying but not race pace.

He emphasised, however, that there was no single area of weakness and did not believe something needed to be “unlocked” on the cars of Leclerc and Carlos Sainz. “I’m more convinced that we have to improve everywhere than just on one topic,” he said.

“We are speaking about tenths, not about seconds, and we show on some occasions that we are able to fight with Red Bull at least in qualifying.

“It means the potential of the car is there and we have to understand why we have a bit less performance in the race and try to improve in these conditions.” REUTERS