{"id":336354,"date":"2025-12-10T07:53:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T07:53:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/336354\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T07:53:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T07:53:08","slug":"red-bull-reveal-why-max-verstappen-did-not-play-tactics-with-mclaren-in-f1-title-decider","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/336354\/","title":{"rendered":"Red Bull reveal why Max Verstappen did not &#8216;play tactics&#8217; with McLaren in F1 title decider"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies has explained why Max Verstappen did not back the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris during the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.<\/p>\n<p>The Milton Keynes-based squad ultimately decided against &#8220;playing tactics&#8221; during the title decider, which Verstappen won comfortably from pole.<\/p>\n<p>However, with Norris clinching the third and final podium position at the Yas Marina Circuit, the British driver beat the four-time F1 drivers&#8217; champion to the crown by two points.<\/p>\n<p>McLaren neutralised the threat of Verstappen strategically pushing its two drivers into the chasing pack in the opening phase of the 58-lap race by starting Piastri on hard tyres.<\/p>\n<p>Mekies acknowledged <a href=\"https:\/\/racingnews365.com\/red-bull-admit-surprise-at-clever-mclaren-strategy-in-f1-title-showdown\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">it was &#8220;quite clever&#8221;<\/a> from the constructors&#8217; champions and admitted his team did not expect it.<\/p>\n<p>The Australian was eventually run so long into the race that the Red Bull driver pitted and re-passed him on Lap 41.<\/p>\n<p>When Piastri came in the following lap, it provided Verstappen the opportunity to pit for a second time and retain the lead, something that would have then allowed him to deploy the approach which was anticipated pre-race, something Lewis Hamilton tried to no avail against Nico Rosberg at the same circuit in 2016.<\/p>\n<p>However, that second pit stop did not come, and the Dutchman took the chequered flag by over 12 seconds.<\/p>\n<p>In his post-race debrief with the press, Mekies explained why Verstappen did not conform to expectations.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was possible to do it,&#8221; the Frenchman told media, including RacingNews365. &#8220;We didn&#8217;t feel it was the right option for us.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We would have given up quite a large advantage by doing so, and we didn&#8217;t think that playing tactics would give us an edge, with other situations we were in.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;So we chose to stay out to maximise the advantage we had and to concentrate on winning the race.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The 48-year-old revealed Red Bull had considered the idea, but ultimately took the view that the action behind Verstappen was outside of its control.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And, as we said, we can&#8217;t control what&#8217;s behind us,&#8221; Mekies added. &#8220;We did discuss that option, but we stuck to our plan.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies has explained why Max Verstappen did not back the McLarens of Oscar&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":336355,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,2476,578,2479,2477,2480,2478,930,576,577,932,1885,2475,582,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-336354","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-formula-1","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-daniel-ricciardo","11":"tag-f1","12":"tag-f1-calendar","13":"tag-f1-live","14":"tag-f1-results","15":"tag-f1-standings","16":"tag-ferrari","17":"tag-formula-1","18":"tag-formula1","19":"tag-lewis-hamilton","20":"tag-max-verstappen","21":"tag-motorsport","22":"tag-racing","23":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336354\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/336355"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}