Red Bull find themselves in unfamiliar territory ahead of the Hungarian Grand Prix

In what is a rarity for the the 2023 Formula 1 season, Red Bull faces a somewhat uncertain Sunday at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Max Verstappen, the leader in the Drivers’ Championship by a large margin, will start the Grand Prix in second behind Lewis Hamilton. Verstappen will also have to contend with the McLaren duo of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, who start the Grand Prix next to each other on the second row.

Teammate Sergio Pérez managed to advance to the third segment of qualifying for the first time since the Miami Grand Prix at the start of May, but he could do no better than ninth, only finishing ahead of Nico Hülkenberg in Q3.

Even more worrying for Pérez might be the fact that the lap he posted on the soft compound in Q3 — 1:17.045 — was only slightly faster than the time Norris posted in Q2, which topped the charts at 1:17.328.

While Norris was on the medium compound.

It would seem that the Bulls have their work cut out for them as the Hungarian Grand Prix looms, something the team acknowledged in their post-qualifying report.

“We have not performed the way we should be performing all weekend, it has been really difficult to get the most out of the car,” said Verstappen. “I was struggling with putting the balance together, front to rear. We tried a lot of different things in terms of set-up but it didn’t really work. When you are struggling in qualifying you can only try one or two things and then when you really push you fall out of the window again. My second lap in Q3 I tried to push a bit more and the car wasn’t there.”

This is a marked contrast from what we are used to hearing from Verstappen and Red Bull following qualifying sessions.

Team Principal Christian Horner noted that Verstappen seemed uncomfortable in the RB19, particularly on shorter runs.

“Max didn’t seem too comfortable with his set up, he wasn’t able to find his sweet spot, you could see he was fighting the car slightly,” said Horner. “I don’t think he was getting what he wanted from the car in quali as he seemed more comfortable in the long runs we did earlier today so we will be looking into it this evening.”

As for Pérez, he admitted that a mistake in Q3 might have cost him a chance at a better result. Still, for him to finally reach Q3 after so many mishaps in recent weeks, it felt as if he had taken a step in the right direction.

“Today was such a tight battle that was dominated by the compounds and the new tyre format. You don’t get many learnings on the tyres so we don’t have too much information from them for this weekend,” said Pérez. “In Q3, I had a poor sector one on the last lap which set us back, however, we have had a solid day and are focusing all our efforts on tomorrow.”

Pérez, Verstappen, and Horner all believe that Sunday could find the Bulls pushing for the front, despite their performance on Saturday. “It will be ten degrees hotter which will make things interesting, especially with the balance, but we tend to have better race pace than we do in qualifying so let’s see what tomorrow brings,” said Horner.

“I believe we can be competitive and aim to finish on the podium as we have a good race car and a strong race pace,” added Pérez. “The track here is harder to overtake on but I am confident we will have a good performance: everything is to play for on race day.”

“The balance I had in qualifying won’t necessarily be a bad thing for tomorrow. Everything in the race is a lot calmer and more stable, whereas in qualifying you really push it to the limit on the balance and can feel more issues,” said Verstappen. “Our long run looks competitive so that is positive. It is still going to be tough to get in front but if we are better on tyres then I predict a good race. Nothing is lost, we have a good race car and it will be a good battle with them tomorrow.”

Sunday is a big day for the team, as Red Bull is sitting on 11-straight victories dating back to the 2022 season finale in Abu Dhabi. That ties the mark set by McLaren to start the 1988 season, a year that saw McLaren end up winning all but one race.

Whether Red Bull can make that history on Sunday might come down to just how much they can figure out prior to the lights going out at the Hungaroring.