Mekies hails Red Bull upgrade breakthrough after Verstappen’s Austrian GP charge

Red Bull’s Austrian step finally shows on race day

Laurent Mekies hailed Red Bull’s Austrian Grand Prix performance as the team’s strongest race of the season, after Max Verstappen converted a difficult build-up into a season-best second place at the squad’s home event.

Red Bull arrived in Austria with one of its most significant upgrade packages of the campaign, including changes to the floor and rear suspension aimed at improving both performance and reliability. The weekend did not begin cleanly, with teething problems in Free Practice followed by Verstappen’s heavy Q3 crash, which left him starting only fifth.

From there, however, the race became the clearest evidence yet that Red Bull has made a meaningful step. Verstappen quickly moved forward, passing Kimi Antonelli’s Mercedes and Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari in one move on Lap 2, before winning a tense fight with Lewis Hamilton. He then steadily reduced George Russell’s lead, finishing less than two seconds behind the Mercedes driver.

For more on how Verstappen assessed the updated RB22 after the race, read our analysis of why Red Bull’s upgrades turned the car into an Austrian GP win contender.

Mekies: Red Bull now within striking range

Reflecting on the result, Mekies said the performance confirmed the progress Red Bull had sensed after qualifying but could not yet quantify. “It’s a very, very strong race, probably undoubtedly the strongest race we have done this season,” he said. “To see us getting so close to the ultimate pace needed to win here on a difficult track in very hot weather is a good witness of how much work went on in Milton Keynes and how strong Max today was really in all phases of the race.”

Red Bull had taken time to find its rhythm under the new regulations and did not score a podium until Verstappen’s third place in Canada. Austria, though, suggested the team may now be moving back into the leading fight.

Mekies admitted Red Bull was not concealing its true pace before the race. The uncertainty, he explained, came from qualifying issues that made it difficult to know whether the team was one, two or three tenths away.

“The race was the one that was going to give us the real number of how much we really closed the gap,” he said. “We started the season more than a second away from the pace to win a race. The Miami package took us back to the half a second region, and now it’s great with the package we had today.”

Strategy questions remain secondary

Asked whether a more aggressive strategy might have pushed Verstappen closer to victory, Mekies refused to dwell on hypotheticals. “‘If’ and ‘would’ and ‘should’ will not win races,” he said. Red Bull, instead, will take the closest gap to victory it has achieved this season — and use it as fuel for the next step.