Both Red Bulls drivers were confident based on Friday running that the team can be best of the rest behind Mercedes in this weekend's German Grand Prix. The two Red Bulls finished up fourth and fifth in today's second practice session, with Max Verstappen ahead.
Their best times were some eight tenths off Nico Rosberg's headline pace but Verstappen's mark was within a quarter of a second of that of Sebastian Vettel's Ferrari in P3.
Verstappen admitted afterwards that beating Mercedes to the race win is not likely. "No I don't think [we can] win the race", he said. "We need a lot of luck, but if we get close we can be happy."
And despite being behind Vettel in the final Friday standings Verstappen was positive about the day. "We know they would come closer to us, Ferrari, it's a better track for them in general, but still we are not too far off the Mercedes" he said.
"It was a pretty good day, also for me, the first time for me in a Formula One car here, so I think everything went quite smoothly today."
His team mate Daniel Ricciardo predicted that Red Bull's qualifying fight with Ferrari will be tight, but the Red Bull is stronger than the Ferrari on race pace. "I think on one lap it's going to be really close [with Ferrari]", said Ricciardo. "Looking at today Seb won the Ferrari-Red Bull battle, but I think we can get a little bit more out of one lap, and it should be a good battle.
"All going well tomorrow we can qualify third – that will be the target.
"And beyond that…this afternoon the race stint looks really good so if we can replicate what we did then on Sunday I think we have a really good chance". Verstappen agreed. "I think in the long runs it was all pretty positive" he said.
