Red Bull’s ‘Scrapheap Challenge’ admission after very rare Max Verstappen mistake

Christian Horner said the job to salvage Max Verstappen’s “totally trashed” floor was like something out of “Scrapheap Challenge” for the Red Bull crew.

Verstappen suffered a very uncharacteristic error during the opening Q1 segment of qualifying for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, sliding into the gravel at Copse as the rain began to fall, making for very tricky conditions on the dry tyres.

Max Verstappen floor ‘totally trashed’ in Q1 scare

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher and Sam Cooper

Verstappen was able to drive through the gravel and return to the track, but it came at a cost, as it inflicted major floor damage which he would carry on his Red Bull RB20 for the rest of qualifying.

He went on to qualify P4, just under four-tenths off the pace, but just a tenth-and-a-half back from McLaren’s Lando Norris in P3, Red Bull team principal Horner felt that was a job well done considering the state that Verstappen’s floor was in.

Horner would liken the scenario to a scene of Scrapheap Challenge, a former British TV show where teams of contestants used items found in a scrapyard to create a working machine capable of performing a specific task.

“The floor yesterday was totally trashed,” Horner told media including PlanetF1.com.

“So actually, the lap time he did in qualy, to be as close as he was…if you’d have seen the floor, it was like something out of Scrapheap Challenge that the mechanics have managed to put back together. It was super impressive.

“And so his lap time yesterday, to only be a tenth off Lando, I thought was very encouraging.”

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Red Bull senior advisor Helmut Marko said Verstappen had lost around 100 points in downforce due to the damage, which Horner confirmed, though a chunk of that was clawed back with repairs during qualifying ahead of a full fix for race day.

But, Horner said that beyond just the downforce loss, the balance of Verstappen’s Red Bull was also impacted.

“First of all, you’ve got to look at the amount of load,” said Horner. “I mean, at one point, it was 100 points of load, and then suddenly, we managed to recover a reasonable portion of that with repairs that the mechanics were able to do in between the sessions.

“But of course it’s not just the load, it’s how it then changes your balance. And so suddenly, he got no front end, he was having to have a little lift in Copse, whereas it was absolutely flat previously, so it took away that balance.”

Verstappen delivered an impressive drive to P2 on Grand Prix Sunday at Silverstone, increasing his Drivers’ Championship lead to 84 points over Norris.

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