Mixed fortunes for Red Bull after challenging Friday at the Spanish GP

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was optimistic after Friday’s FP2 session at the 2025 F1 Spanish GP. The four-time world champion enjoyed strong pace during both Free Practice sessions, finishing P2 in FP1 and P3 in FP2. Though he failed to match his form in Imola, he deemed his performance as progress as Red Bull seeks to recover after a disappointing Monaco GP. However, his teammate, Yuki Tsunoda could not match his optimism. The Japanese driver struggled with pace throughout the race, and though he managed clean laps and maintained decent balance, he could explain the performance gap to his teammate.

Verstappen finds positives in challenging Friday at the 2025 Spanish GP

While speaking to the media after Friday’s activities at the Spanish GP, Verstappen reflected positively on his day, showing cautious optimism about his RB21’s performance. The Red Bull driver also described the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya as “enjoyable to drive” and through he acknowledged some challenges, he believes that the Milton Keynes-based team have made some progress.

“It’s always nice to be here – the track is always very enjoyable to drive. It’s quite hot out there as well, especially for the tyres. But I think it was an okay Friday – we’ve had worse Fridays!”

“I felt a bit happier with the car, we’re still not where we want to be but it was definitely a bit more positive.”

Verstappen was measured in his in his assessment of Red Bull’s performance after the Friday Free Practice session at the Spanish GP. While pleased with his team’s progress, he admitted that there were still some things lacking. He aslo address the impact of the new front wing load tests. While many many expected the new regulations to shake up to order, Verstappen downplayed any major effect.

“No, not… I mean every track is a bit different but the feeling, I still want a better feeling from the car. But I’ve also had Fridays where we were completely out of it, so it’s a bit more, I would say in the middle.”

“I mean, if you look at the standings, not a lot [is different]! From my side that was also not really expected.”

Tsunoda frustrated by lack of pace of his Red Bull despite smooth start to Spanish GP

Yuki Tsunoda, on the other hand, painted a bleaker picture. The Japanese driver suffered a puzzling and difficult session. Describing his day as “[It was] tricky,” he admitted that, despite things running smoothly compared to other Fridays, he lacked performance for reasons that he could not yet determine.

“[It was] tricky, To be honest, in terms of first day compared to other Grands Prix, it felt pretty smooth. Myself, I think I made progress from FP1 [to] FP2. To be honest, I don’t have any idea why I am slow.”

“The lap was pretty good as well during FP2, and obviously it’s not fully 100% but it’s not the gap that I expected. It’s hard to even tell what kind of exact limitation I have, in terms of balance it’s okay. I’ll have to see what we can improve, but [we’re] struggling.”

Tsunoda admitted that solving the pace issues he faced during FP1 and FP2 of the Spanish GP would be challenging for him and Red Bull. He predicted a demanding evening ahead of the team, with improvements needed ahead of Saturday’s Qualifying.

“Hopefully we can find something, otherwise it’s really tough. It’s not like I had a massive mistake and I’m behind compared to competitors quite a lot – if I had [made a] mistake with that result, I’m happy actually, but it’s not like that.”

“[It] probably will be a longer night than usual. I’ll try my best to find the solution, but currently it’s not very clear.”