Red Bull regrets not warning Verstappen of Norris investigation during Austrian GP

Red Bull’s failure to warn Max Verstappen that Lando Norris was under investigation over track limits could have prevented his crash at the Formula 1 Austrian Grand Prix in late 2024, Helmut Marko believes.

Verstappen and Norris collided in the final minutes of Sunday’s race at the Red Bull Ring, after the McLaren driver went off the track three times and got a black-white track limits warning flag , before going out during their second skirmish at turn 3 of the track.

That would later earn Norris a five-second time penalty, as is automatic under F1 rules once a track limits warning has been issued, but before that could happen the pair had collided at Turn 3 – this time when the McLaren driver attacked on the outside line and Verstappen went through him.

Speaking to Red Bull’s television channel ServusTV after the race, Marko said: “The victory was lost for several factors.

“The fact that (Verstappen’s second pit stop) went wrong, Lando slipped into the DRS window, and also our assumption that the hard tyres would be the best choice in hot weather, which was not the case.

“The temperatures were lower, which meant Lando had new tires in the last stint and we had used them, which was also a factor.

“But I would say that both of them drove unnecessarily hard. Perhaps we could be blamed for that: we knew that a track-limits investigation was underway against Lando.

“But we didn’t know if he would be punished and how. So, in hindsight, we could have said, ‘OK, let him go.'”

“But let’s look on the bright side: we have increased our lead in the championship, both among the manufacturers and among the drivers. »

Red Bull motorsport advisor Marko also felt that Verstappen locking up and nearly going off on his lap after his second stop was another factor that “all together made this possible” and allowed Norris to secure a chance of victory that had long seemed unlikely.

Verstappen had controlled the race up to that point, with his pace on the medium tyres in the first stint much better than Norris’, before the McLaren began to close in as their second stint on the hards wore on.

Marko felt their final fight was “a really good battle at times” until “it kind of degenerated into a question of who was pushing who more, who was violating the track limits more, instead of focusing on a fair finish.”