How Red Bull turned their Singapore GP weekend around

Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez had a nightmare of a Friday in Singapore as they struggled to get to grips with their RB20s, way off the pace and not able to find any solutions in the first two practice sessions.

But come qualifying, Verstappen was second on the grid behind Lando Norris, albeit two tenths off the pace. He raced to second as well on Sunday, unable to keep up with Norris but clear of the rest of the field.

Red Bull boss Christian Horner revealed his team have done a massive job over the course of Friday night at the team's headquarters in Milton Keynes, with reserve driver Sebastien Buemi spending a lot of time in the simulator trying out solutions for a better setup for the RB20, something the team evidently succeeded with given Verstappen's improved form in qualifying.

It appeared that Red Bull came to Singapore this year with the nightmare of 2023 in mind, as their car just did not work well on the kerbs, which meant the team came with an initial setup that was too conservative and targeted an improved ride, which compromised the performance and mechanical grip of the car.

After the work done by Buemi, the team at the track went back on the setup and found a better balance for the car, which made both drivers happier with it.

Speaking about the work Buemi did, Horner joked: "He [Buemi] was consuming plenty of Red Bull to keep him going. He played an important part, as does the whole team, in working hard with long days and long nights.

"I think we wanted to avoid a repeat of last year and perhaps we overcompensated," he later explained. "I think the way the team reacted, the effort that went into that reaction, we were able to give Max a much better car on Saturday. And obviously in the race we couldn't compete with Lando [Norris], but we had the rest of the field covered."

Moreover, Horner believes his team are on their way to recovery with their car issues, with an update planned for the upcoming Formula 1 race in Austin targeting more improved.

He claimed: "I think we've got a vein of development, and I think we've understood some of the issues with the car. I think we're starting to address them.

"We were better in Baku; we were better here. So yeah, there'll be a lot of late nights in Milton Keynes," Horner concluded.