‘Fundamental’ Red Bull kerb-riding issue made Max Verstappen’s car “like a go-kart”

Max Verstappen says Red Bull’s kerb-riding weakness left him feeling like he was driving a “go-kart” during F1 Monaco Grand Prix qualifying.

Reigning world champion Verstappen missed the chance to claim a record-breaking pole position and could only qualify sixth-fastest after striking the barrier with his final lap of Q3.

Verstappen and teammate Sergio Perez, who was knocked out in Q1 in 18th, have both struggled with the handling of their cars all weekend, with the Red Bull losing time over Monaco’s bumps and kerbs.

“We tried a lot of things on the car, literally nothing made it better, so you’re just stuck,” Verstappen explained. 

“Not much you can do. We really tried to optimise it but at one point when you’re stuck with that… you can see in the second sector we are so bad.

“Just because I can’t touch any kerbs as it just upsets the car too much, just lose a lot of lap time and incredibly difficult.”

Verstappen added: “We went soft, stiff, everything, but the car is like a go-kart, it’s like I’m running without suspension.

“It’s jumping around a lot, not absorbing any kerb strikes or bumps or camber changes. The last corner I think the amount of times I just jumped  almost into the wall is really incredible.

“It’s also not something new. We’ve had this problem since 2022 of course for the last years we had a car advantage and it gets masked a little bit.

“But with everyone catching up naturally when you’re not improving your weakest point you get found out and that’s what happened this weekend.”

Verstappen admitted the issue is a "fundamental problem" and "not something that will be fixed within weeks”.

“First of all we need to understand what it is because we clearly don’t understand it,” he said.

“But we’ll work hard to try and find the problem and then of course try to get rid of it. I don’t know if we can do it this year but hopefully for next year.”

Asked what is possible in Sunday’s grand prix, Verstappen replied: “F*** knows.

“I mean I’m pushing flat out, the car is just super tricky. Went into Turn 1, suddenly I go over the bumps and it just snaps on you.

“There’s nothing that was a big mistake but the car is literally on an knife-edge to drive, it is what it is.”