{"id":189253,"date":"2025-10-10T00:02:04","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T00:02:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/189253\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T00:02:04","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T00:02:04","slug":"verstappen-admits-mercedes-likely-to-lead-under-2026-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/189253\/","title":{"rendered":"Verstappen admits Mercedes likely to lead under 2026 rules"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"date\">OCTOBER  9, 2025<\/p>\n<p>Max Verstappen says he expects Mercedes to have the upper hand when Formula 1&#8217;s all-new regulations arrive next year.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.grandprix.com\/display\/photo?photo_caption=Max+Verstappen%2C+Singapore+GP+2025&amp;photo_copyright=%C2%A9+Red+Bull&amp;photo_url=https%3A%2F%2Fphotos.grandprix.com%2Fjpeg%2Fraces%2Fpsin25%2Ffri%2Fred%2Fverstappen19-lg.jpg\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/verstappen19-rd.jpg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Max Verstappen, Singapore GP 2025<br \/>\u00a9 Red Bull<\/p>\n<p>Although Toto Wolff was known to have made a strong approach to lure the four-time world champion, Verstappen ultimately chose to stay at Red Bull despite Christian Horner&#8217;s departure and the uncertainty around the team&#8217;s in-house power unit project.<\/p>\n<p>Next year won&#8217;t be easy with our own engine, of course, Verstappen told Sky Deutschland. That&#8217;s a new risk for Red Bull, but they also took that risk by entering Formula 1, and they didn&#8217;t do a bad job.<\/p>\n<p>He refrained from dismissing suggestions that Mercedes could again dominate as it did in 2014 when new hybrid rules first came in.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s difficult to say, Verstappen added. I do believe Mercedes will be at the front. They&#8217;re always there and always strong. They&#8217;re a top company. So I do believe they&#8217;ll be at the front, especially when it comes to the engine.<\/p>\n<p>Still, he insisted Red Bull is fully committed to the challenge. We&#8217;re definitely giving it our all. I hope we&#8217;re close, but of course I don&#8217;t know.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking separately to Viaplay over the Singapore GP weekend, Verstappen was asked about Red Bull&#8217;s sudden performance surge following Horner&#8217;s exit and Laurent Mekies&#8217; arrival.<\/p>\n<p>Asked whether something specific had changed, he smiled: Yes. But nobody needs to know that.<\/p>\n<p>When the interviewer apologised for pushing further, Verstappen replied: Yeah, that&#8217;s fine. It doesn&#8217;t matter, because I&#8217;m not going to say anything. The important thing is that we perform better.<\/p>\n<p>Although no longer entirely out of the championship fight, Verstappen concedes a fifth straight drivers&#8217; crown is unlikely.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m not that worried about it, he said. I already have a lot of things on my mind, which I also enjoy. I just show up at the circuit and do my best. Maybe there&#8217;s a chance. I&#8217;m trying to make the most of it, but I&#8217;m not worried about it.<\/p>\n<p>(GMM)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OCTOBER 9, 2025 Max Verstappen says he expects Mercedes to have the upper hand when Formula 1&#8217;s all-new&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":189254,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[8630,8552,8581,8607,8594,8540,7984,8588,8627,639,8616,8561,8565,7816,891,8571,8602,8593,1687,8538,8600,8545,6542,831,8097,372,7318,6537,8564,8573,8590,8541,8542,8536,8604,1373,8557,8605,8622,8609,1348,8583,8625,8535,8537,8555,386,8572,8558,8547,8567,8551,8596,8563,8543,8577,8629,8585,8575,832,8578,8560,8624,8626,8606,8556,1469,6864,8617,8620,8592,8619,8580,8628,6865,3005,8597,8568,8549,8546,8584,8569,8587,8610,3004,8539,3803,8611,8554,8576,8589,8566,8623,8582,7386,8544,8579,8548,8562,8618,8098,3718,8621,101,8614,8615,8598,8559,8613,8612,8570,1644,56,54,55,8601,8608,8591,8550,8553,8574,2922,8599,8595,8603,8586],"class_list":["post-189253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-f1","tag-abu-dhabi","tag-adrian-sutil","tag-albers","tag-alesi","tag-ammermuller","tag-autoracing","tag-autos","tag-badoer","tag-bahrain","tag-barcelona","tag-benetton","tag-bruno-senna","tag-button","tag-cars","tag-china","tag-david-coulthard","tag-davidson","tag-doornbos","tag-f1","tag-f1-racing","tag-fauzy","tag-felipe-massa","tag-fernando-alonso","tag-ferrari","tag-fia","tag-formula-1","tag-formula-one","tag-formula1","tag-giancarlo-fisichella","tag-gilles-villeneuve","tag-glock","tag-grand-prix","tag-grandprix","tag-grandprix-com","tag-hakkinen","tag-hamilton","tag-heikki-kovalainen","tag-hill","tag-hockenheim","tag-honda","tag-hungary","tag-ide","tag-indianapolis","tag-inside-f1","tag-insidef1-com","tag-jaime-alguesuari","tag-japan","tag-jaques-villeneuve","tag-jarno-trulli","tag-jenson-button","tag-juan-pablo-montoya","tag-kamui-kobayashi","tag-karthikeyan","tag-karun-chandhok","tag-kimi-raikkonen","tag-klien","tag-korea","tag-kovalainen","tag-kubica","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-liuzzi","tag-lucas-di-grassi","tag-magny-cours","tag-malaysia","tag-mansell","tag-mark-webber","tag-mclaren","tag-michael-schumacher","tag-minardi","tag-monaco","tag-montagny","tag-monte-carlo","tag-monteiro","tag-montreal","tag-monza","tag-motorsport","tag-nakajima","tag-nick-heidfeld","tag-nico-hulkenberg","tag-nico-rosberg","tag-paffett","tag-pedro-de-la-rosa","tag-piquet","tag-prost","tag-racing","tag-racingcars","tag-red-bull","tag-renault","tag-robert-kubica","tag-rosberg","tag-rossiter","tag-rubens-barrichello","tag-san-marino","tag-sato","tag-sauber","tag-schumacher","tag-scott-speed","tag-sebastian-vettel","tag-sebastien-buemi","tag-senna","tag-silverstone","tag-singapore","tag-spa","tag-sports","tag-spyker","tag-super-aguri","tag-sutil","tag-timo-glock","tag-toro-rosso","tag-toyota","tag-trulli","tag-turkey","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-valles","tag-verstappen","tag-vettel","tag-vitaly-petrov","tag-vitantonio-liuzzi","tag-webber","tag-williams","tag-winkelhock","tag-wurz","tag-yamamoto","tag-zonta"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189253\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}