Max Verstappen has described a \u201cgood start\u201d for Red Bull in 2026 following the debut of their new car and new power unit at the Barcelona Shakedown.<\/p>\n
After some two decades of works and supply engine deals, Red Bull<\/a> made the call to go in-house ahead of F1\u2019s new regulation cycle \u2013 preparing a bespoke power unit within a dedicated Red Bull Powertrains facility at Milton Keynes over the last few years.<\/p>\n Verstappen<\/a> and new-for-2026 team mate Isack Hadjar<\/a> completed the first laps with the Red Bull-powered RB22 during last week\u2019s running in Spain \u2013 and the initial comments from both drivers have been positive.<\/p>\n \u201cI think overall pretty decent,\u201d reflected Verstappen, who was shaking off a cold, as the Shakedown drew to a close.<\/p>\n \u201cThe first morning I didn\u2019t get to do too many laps, also with the weather basically, but [the final day] was good. I did a lot of laps, we learned a lot. Still a lot of things that we want to look into and do better, but that\u2019s normal, I guess.<\/p>\n \u201cIn general, with the new engine, to do the amount of laps that we did is very nice, and it\u2019s a good start for us, so yeah, positive, but it\u2019s still very early days.\u201d<\/p>\n When asked about the key takeaways on the engine side, after Hadjar\u2019s \u201cimpressive\u201d assessment<\/a>, the Dutchman added: \u201cStill a work in progress, but I think we\u2019ve hit the ground running quite well with those things.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s still a very complicated formula, I think, for everyone, so there\u2019s still quite a bit of work to do, but it\u2019s normal.\u201d<\/p>\n Speaking earlier in the week, Red Bull team boss Laurent Mekies hailed the entire organisation\u2019s efforts in getting to this point, having previously called the decision to build a power unit from scratch \u201cas crazy as it gets\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI have to say, in terms of what we were expecting from the power unit on these first couple of days, I can only repeat how proud we are from everybody back at base to have managed to give us something that we can actually run with,\u201d he commented.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, it\u2019s very early days and of course, nothing is perfect, but we could run, we could start to learn, work as one team, so that was a huge satisfaction.<\/p>\n \u201cIt doesn\u2019t change the size of the journey in front of us, but certainly it\u2019s a first moment that everybody in Milton Keynes should be proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n