Everything Red Bull's doing to convince Verstappen to stay

With Max Verstappen openly contemplating his future in Formula 1, Red Bull knows it needs to leave no stone unturned in efforts to keep hold of its star asset.

While Verstappen’s primary bugbear of the 2026 rules is something Red Bull cannot change directly itself, there are some elements that are more under its influence.

It well knows that even if F1 does not end up in a place where the cars are a joy for drivers such as Verstappen to race, it can at least put around the four-time F1 champion the equipment, personnel and feel-good factor that could outweigh any negatives.

So far from feeling that current competitive challenges are weakening its hand, team boss Laurent Mekies insists that the "fire" is raging within the Red Bull factory to return to the top.

"The campus is on fire," he said. "It’s not that we like being in discomfort, but the atmosphere right now is fantastic in terms of trying to turn around what seems to be a difficult thing to turn around."

Here are some key areas that Red Bull is focused on in its bid to convince Verstappen that there is a bright future for him at Milton Keynes.

New staff

Verstappen now finds himself inside a Red Bull organisation very different to the one that took him to his run of world championship success.

Gone over the past few seasons are many of the leading architects of his rise - including team boss Christian Horner, technical chief Adrian Newey, advisor Helmut Marko, and sporting manager Jonathan Wheatley.

But more recently there have been exits from those much closer to him and who he worked with directly in the garage – including lead mechanic Matt Caller, and senior engineers Tom Hart, Michael Manning, and David Mart.

Perhaps the biggest of all though is that long-serving engineer Gianpiero Lambiase recently agreed a move to McLaren for 2028 at the latest.

Combined together, it would be easy to conclude that Verstappen would feel that the direction of travel is one way – and there is an irreversible brain drain going on.

But that is not the case according to Mekies, who has insisted that the run of departures of those close to Verstappen do not make it more likely that he will leave too.

"Absolutely not," declared Mekies. "That's my direct answer to you. 

"Obviously, we speak with Max every day, and Max knows motorsport upside down. He is living and breathing in this team. He knows most of these guys and he understands very well the dynamics that can happen."

Red Bull has certainly been eager to highlight to Verstappen that the recruitment situation inside the squad is different from the external perception of it bleeding people.

Last week Verstappen was invited along, during a factory visit at Milton Keynes, to Red Bull’s regular recruits get together – where all those hired in a quarter are formally welcomed.

He was greeted by more than 100 new personnel across Red Bull Racing and Red Bull Powertrains – highlighting that this is far from a team facing dwindling numbers.

Mekies added: "He was there when we welcomed the 120 people, and I think in the last nine months we hired more than 400 people.

"We monitor very precisely the flows in and out to our colleagues at the top teams.

"The best luck we have is the amount of talents we have and the constant, dynamic environment that makes them rise. And that's where we need to focus, where we decide to focus."

Mekies does not hide that losing staff of the calibre of Lambiase is not great, but he says that rather than rue what has happened, critical is creating a team and atmosphere that will attract the best people in the future.

"[I’m] super happy for GP," said Mekies. "He has an amazing opportunity. He has been with us for 10 years and he's going to be with us for the next two years, fair enough.

"But the global context is it's a team that keeps creating talents. We have 2000 people, and that's how we value things.

"We think we have the best people. So as much as we completely acknowledge the fact that, yes, we have lost talent, we do everything we can and more to make sure we have the best working environment that everybody will die to come work here."

New car

Red Bull has been quite open that its deficit to the front is not just down to the power unit.

The RB22 has lacked downforce compared to the top three squads but its handling has also been inconsistent.

The car's behaviour has fluctuated session to session, and also lap to lap – making it difficult for Verstappen and Isack Hadjar to gain confidence with it.

Plus, worse than that, set-up changes do not seem to be making any difference when it comes to trying to get it into a good operating window

As Verstappen said at the Japanese Grand Prix: "It just doesn’t respond, basically."

The team has used the opportunity since Japan to go "deep", according to Mekies, on a range of improvements to the car aimed at addressing as much of the shortfall as possible.

A glimpse of the Miami package RB22 came at a Silverstone filming day and intriguingly included a solution similar to Ferrari’s ‘upside down’ rear wing.

But while there is hope that the change can lift Red Bull closer to the top three squads than it was in Japan, the team is not pretending that it has found a magical solution.

As Mekies said: "We haven't solved everything, but there is no doubt that progress has been made into giving something more consistent to our drivers.

"How does that make you fit in the classification? It's impossible to know. But in terms of us alone on the track, in terms of giving a more consistent product to our drivers, I'm confident we've made some progress.

"Do we know if we cracked everything? No. We know we didn't crack everything yet, but a fair chunk of it."

Any progress will be super-critical in showing Verstappen that Red Bull has a handle on what has gone wrong, and that it has a plan in place to get on top of what needs doing.

New future

Verstappen’s thoughts on whether or not to stay with Red Bull in F1 are not just about the here and now – they will also rest on the long-term vision.

This is one area where Red Bull can offer something significant – and tangible – that is growing on its Technology Campus in Milton Keynes.

Verstappen will not have been able to miss last week the ongoing construction of an important building taking place there: its new windtunnel.

It is well understood that Red Bull’s efforts with its cars over recent years have been compromised by its aged Bedford windtunnel.

While the facility's internal configuration may be state of the art, there are downsides to its ancient concrete structure that makes its results far from consistent thanks to the fluctuating British weather.

Not being totally insulated from the external temperatures means air density changes with the seasons – and that is enough to throw results out of kilter.

This is why Red Bull has signed off on a brand new windtunnel in Milton Keynes - built to the standard expected now for consistent results. It is due to come into operation in the middle of next year.

For Mekies, the upside from finally having that on tap should not be downplayed – and it is something that he hopes will speak a lot to Verstappen about where Red Bull can be longer term.

"It's going to put us for the next decade in a very different place in terms of correlation capabilities," Mekies said.

"It's true that the opposition may have shot earlier compared to us in some respects, but globally, in terms of the legs of the project, it put us into an incredible position."