F1 2026 underdog Red Bull hopes it can show Max Verstappen 'enough progress'

Red Bull F1 team boss Laurent Mekies hopes his squad's in-season development will be enough to convince Max Verstappen to stay put as it embarks on its greatest challenge yet as a fully fledged manufacturer.

F1 is set for its biggest regulatory overhaul in a generation with major changes to both the hybrid power units and the chassis rules. Red Bull has added to that challenge by entering its first in-house power units developed and built at Red Bull Powertrains in Milton Keynes, with help from Ford.

Team principal Laurent Mekies has never shied away from the huge mountain Red Bull has to climb to get on par with established power unit manufacturers like Mercedes, Ferrari and Honda, so the team has modestly taken on an underdog role for the start of the 2026 season.

If its worst-case scenario does come to pass, it would be a similar scenario to 2025 when Red Bull's early struggles led to mounting speculation over Verstappen's future. The four-time world champion is known to have performance-related exit clauses in his contract, that otherwise runs to 2028. Following exploratory talks with Mercedes, Verstappen reaffirmed his commitment to Red Bull for 2026, but rumours about his future are bound to resurface over the coming months.

Speaking at the Autosport Business Exchange in London, Mekies said Verstappen was fully on board with Red Bull's long-term vision, and it is up to the Milton Keynes operation to show enough progress throughout 2026 to earn the Dutchman's confidence.

"One of the many incredible things with Max is that he's not sitting outside of the project watching and judging what we do," Mekies said. "He takes a risk with us and he's aware that when you take risks sometimes you fall. He's aware of the scale of the challenge and he lives and breathes motorsport more than a large part of us.

"Max wants a fast car, so the best way to make sure he wants to stay with us for as long as we can imagine is to give him a fast car - a combination of a fast chassis and a fast PU. We may not get that at the right level for race one, but he will see the trajectories and hopefully we can show him a strong enough trajectory so that he feels that that group of people is going to produce the fastest car possible."

Red Bull Ford Powertrains

Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool

What is speaking in Red Bull's favour is that the team already showcased over the second half of 2025 that it could finally get on top of its largest performance issues, which Verstappen said felt more significant than ultimately losing out on the world title.

The early part of 2026 will also see a huge rate of development across teams, especially in terms of aerodynamics and how the brand-new hybrid power units will be deployed on a software level. There are also catch-up mechanics baked in by the FIA that would afford constructors who are lagging behind with their V6 power unit a number of concessions to develop their way back into contention via additional development opportunities.

"One of the things that will be great for people watching this season is the amount of in-season development you are going to see both on the chassis side and on the PU side," Mekies explained.
"It's going to be three, four, five times more than what we have seen in the last a few seasons, so hopefully the pecking order is evolving through that."