Max Verstappen downbeat on title defence chances after second retirement of the season

Red Bull driver Max Verstappen has said that ‘there is no reason’ to think that he is going to be able to win the championship at this current stage of the season, thanks to the reliability issues he is having.

The RB18 has proven one of the quickest cars on the grid, with it the only one able to challenge Ferrari thus far, but it is also being one of the more fragile with Verstappen seeing two retirements hit him in the first three Grands Prix of the season.

That said, he’s now 46 points off of Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari, which is nearly two whole race victories, and it is clear that the Dutchman, even at this early stage, has got some serious work on to try and turn the season around so he can make himself a double world champion.

Ultimately, if the car cannot finish the race, it doesn’t matter how talented the driver is behind the wheel, and Max now finds himself a little bit snookered in the title fight.

Indeed, he admits that, right now, there is no reason for him to believe that he is going to be a two-time champ come the end of this marathon campaign.

“Being already so far down in the championship, I think it’s 46 points, from now on we need to be ahead,” Verstappen said.

“We need to quicker, which we are not at the moment. And we need to be reliable, which we are also not. So there’s a lot of things to work on.

“I don’t even think about [the championship.] At the moment, there is no reason to believe in it.”

Obviously, if Red Bull can fix their reliability woes then they do have a quick enough car to take on Ferrari but, after three retirements as a team by round three, you’d have to say that remains an ‘if’ for now.