Max Verstappen’s limited mileage on the final day of Formula 1 pre-season testing was a legacy of his Red Bull teammate Pierre Gasly’s heavy crashes.
Red Bull had to repair a heavily damaged RB15 after Gasly shunted at the high-speed Campsa right-hander on the penultimate day of Barcelona testing.
The team flew in parts overnight to complete the rebuild and Verstappen was able to hit the track half an hour after the day start.
However, he completed just 29 laps before Red Bull needed to assess the car’s gearbox, which had been changed after Gasly’s accident, and Verstappen did not emerge from the garage again after midday.
He explained at the end of the day that it was linked to the replaced component, and the fact the team needed a new gearbox the previous week because of a different Gasly crash.
“It’s all related to what happened yesterday,” said Verstappen. “It’s just a shame.
“We were just a bit limited on parts but still the team did an amazing job to turn the car around and get out there. Sometimes that’s the case unfortunately.”
Red Bull did not set a representative lap time during testing, which means its place in the pecking order with new engine partner Honda remains unclear.
The week-two setbacks also dropped it to eighth out of the 10 teams for number of laps completed in testing.
However, Verstappen is hopeful his lack of final-day mileage will “not hurt us too much” and is “quite confident that we can have a good start to the season” in Australia on March 17.
“It can always be better in winter testing but in general we had a very strong winter test,” said Verstappen.
“We did a lot of laps. Even though today was maybe not the best day but in general I think I’ve always been doing over 100 laps, so I can be happy with that.”
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