Max Verstappen believes he will need cars ahead of him to “retire” to go up the order in Sunday’s Mexico City Grand Prix after only qualifying fifth on the grid.
In a surprise turn of form, Red Bull’s Verstappen struggled for pace and will start on the third row, between the Mercedes drivers of George Russell and Kimi Antonelli.
Lando Norris sealed a stunning pole position ahead of both Ferraris, while championship leader Oscar Piastri will start the spot directly behind Verstappen on the grid in seventh.
Verstappen, who has won three of the last four races, trails Piastri by 40 points as he looks to execute the most unfathomable of F1 world championship comebacks.
But asked on Saturday what the issues with Red Bull’s RB21 car were, the Dutchman replied: “If we would know, we would change it – unfortunately we don’t know, we’ve tried so many things, but it’s not been good.
“It’s not the lack of trying, it’s just not finding it. We tried something again, we didn’t get it quite right, it didn’t allow me to push, I knew from Q1 from the first run that that wasn’t going to be it.
“Basically everything we tried didn’t really work.”
Verstappen also believes the racepace is lacking and astonishingly went on to state that, in his view, cars ahead of him will need to retire from Sunday’s grand prix to move up the order.
“There’s no recovery drive when we have no pace, I need people to retire to finish ahead,” he said.
“It’s not suddenly going to change tomorrow.”
Verstappen is chasing a fifth consecutive title while both Norris and Piastri are battling for their first. Norris, in particular, now has a golden chance for a big points swing in his favour on Sunday.
