Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has expressed that the team is eager to reward Max Verstappen‘s decision to remain with a stronger package in Formula 1 in 2026.
After reigning supreme during the early phase of the ground effects era of F1, the Milton Keynes-based squad’s grip on the championship has since petered out.
14 rounds into the season so far, Marko has already thrown in the towel as far as Verstappen’s title prospects are concerned.
After the Hungarian Grand Prix, the four-time World Champion sits 97 points adrift of the leading McLaren pair of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, respectively.
But with the Dutchman announcing that he will still be a Red Bull driver, for 2026 at least, Marko has revealed the team’s main priority when developing the RB22.
“It’s a big release,” Marko said when asked about the 27-year-old’s decision to stay with the team.
“The whole team is really, really enthusiastic to make a better car for him next year,” he concluded.
Verstappen is counting on Red Bull for 2026 title fight
Despite being linked strongly to Mercedes, Verstappen has been pretty adamant about his will to fight with Red Bull for the title again.
Going into the 2026 regulations reset, Red Bull will be thrown into the unknown without Christian Horner at the helm and a brand new power unit collaboration with Ford.
Yet, Verstappen is cautiously optimistic about his chances for gunning for a fifth Drivers’ title next season.
“We had everything really well from the start of the new regulations, and then towards the end it was a bit of a struggle for us,” he admitted to media including Motorsport Week.
“That is something that we have to figure out why. Why we didn’t hit the same kind of progression as maybe some other teams.”
The Dutchman hopes to take inspiration from his maiden title-winning campaign in 2021 when Red Bull finally caught up to the likes of Mercedes in the turbo-hybrid era.
“The previous generation of cars, we had the opposite. We were off in the beginning, and then towards the end we actually made it work,” he continued.
“So sometimes it’s also a bit difficult to explain everything, why or how things are so good or so average.”
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