The current Formula 1 calendar is pretty relentless. Teams have arrived in Jeddah for the fifth race in six weeks as part of a schedule that has so far taken in trips to Australia, China, Japan and Bahrain.
Even in such a short space of time, there have already been some real fluctuations in both form and atmosphere for multiple teams, and none more so than the rollercoaster of emotions at Red Bull.
Australia was fairly positive. Max Verstappen secured a second place in treacherous conditions and was putting pressure on Lando Norris until the very final corner. Then came China, which was less productive but did still offer a reason for optimism as the final stint on hard tires was particularly competitive.
You probably don’t need me to remind you what happened in Japan, where Verstappen pulled out one of his finest qualifying laps to secure pole position on a track where overtaking was going to prove extremely difficult, and converted that into a first victory of the season to move within a point of the championship lead.
At no stage after Suzuka did anyone from Red Bull proclaim that it had solved its car issues, or would be competitive at every venue. But what happened next time out in Bahrain still seemed to hit particularly hard.
The whole weekend was a struggle. Verstappen was complaining of serious balance issues that hurt his ability to manage the tires, and brake problems that were never fully solved despite pre-race changes under parc ferme conditions.
In China, Verstappen walked away with a fourth place from a tricky weekend, but even salvaging sixth place on the final lap in Bahrain did little to appease the frustration that was shown by many of those around him, if not Verstappen himself.
Tensions were high between Helmut Marko and Verstappen’s manager Raymond Vermeulen at the end of the race, when the pair engaged in strong words, although Verstappen insisted there wasn’t much to it.
“To my knowledge, they were having just a conversation about everything — which is allowed,” Verstappen said. “Now, if someone picks up on it, people can always see it in their own way; how people are discussing things.
“But we were all left frustrated with the result and, of course, the things that went wrong in the race. I think that’s where my manager Raymond and Helmut spoke about it — and even Christian came along, as well. So they all had a conversation. That should be allowed. We all care, at the end of the day. We care about the team, we care about the people, we care about results. I think that’s quite normal.”
Verstappen is right. It’s very normal to have such conversations. And it’s also normal to downplay the significance of them in the media. Not that I’m ever complaining about personnel speaking their mind and being open and honest – more of it is needed – but certain members of the team are growing exasperated by the amount of panic that is portrayed straight after a poor result.