McLaren admit to being worried about Max Verstappen at the 2025 British GP as Lando Norris points to a secret weapon in the Red Bull star’s arsenal, after he successfully landed pole position at Silverstone.
Initially looking well out-of-contention on Friday, an exceptional turnaround for the defending world champion and his team managed to land them the starting spot for Sunday’s Grand Prix on June 6.
The star and his engineers managed to find around half-a-second in performance through gambling on a low downforce set-up as they did previously at the Japanese GP in Suzuka and the Saudi Arabian GP in Jeddah, and it paid dividends.
It eliminated the understeer plaguing the Dutch driver throughout the Free Practice sessions and ensured he was instantly into the mix again by Saturday morning; and as perhaps the most dependable man on the grid, he duly stepped up to claim pole.
Now turning his eyes to the 2025 British GP itself, Verstappen could prove to be very problematic for McLaren with the low downforce set-up as Norris points out it could be his secret weapon on the path to victory.
“It’s hard, honestly, to know until you get behind,” Norris told media, including Total-Motorsport.com, of trying to pass his rival. “And you have the dirty air and DRS and things like that.
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“To be honest, at the minute, our DRS speed probably just about matches Max’s speed. So, I think it’ll be tough because we’ll probably catch him in the high speed, but we just won’t really close much when we open the DRS.
“I think it can be tough, but there’s also probably more opportunities than a normal race.”
Can Max Verstappen win the 2025 British GP?
Norris and his teammate, Oscar Piastri, start from third and second on the grid respectively and both admitted whilst the straight-line speed will be a problem, there will be areas around the lap to attack Verstappen.
But with the main overtaking locations coming at the end of the Wellington Straight and Hangar Straight, which are both DRS zones, the Red Bull RB21 could be a very challenging car to pass.
That’s because the Dutchman clocked an incredible 240kph down the Wellington Straight between Turns 5 and 6 – through all of the top-speed measurements, he was never below third. McLaren only appear in the top three once by comparison.
Through the speed trap he produced 328.9kmm, whilst over the finish line he was caught at 262.2kph. Intermediate 1 and 2 have him at 324.7 and 273kph respectively. By contrast, Piastri records 319.4, 359.5, 319.1 and 274.0kph.
“Let’s see. We’ll just go in there and try to do the best we can,” Verstappen told media, including Total-Motorsport.com. “Normally in the race runs, we struggle a bit more on tyre life.
“I don’t know how that will be tomorrow. We have to wait and see a little bit also how the weather will be in general, if there is some rain or not.
“The straight-line speed is nice to have but you still need to manage the tyres around here. It’s very tough with all these high-speed corners.
“But I’m just looking forward to it. I’m not really in a battle, so I’ll just try to have fun and try to get the best possible result.”
Whilst Verstappen will be rapid in a straight-line and very difficult to pass, even with the DRS boost, there are still disadvantages to the low-downforce concept, offering opportunities for McLaren potential solutions.
The main one is that running lower downforce, theoretically, should make traction out of corners a lot more challenging for the champion than the chasing pack behind and a good enough launch could overcome the straight-line deficit with quicker acceleration.
The second, and perhaps most important for McLaren, is that a lower downforce level causes a higher rate of tyre wear. Red Bull will be banking that this is offset by the free air, as it was in Japan, but if it is not then they can potentially undercut and overcut Verstappen.
If the tyre degradation advantage is as extreme as Australia or Austria, then the papaya-coloured cars would simply have so much more grip and speed that they could pick the Dutchman off anyway.
Unlike Japan’s Suzuka circuit or Italy’s Imola circuit, the two sites where Verstappen has managed to win, it is possible to overtake at Silverstone – but passing that Red Bull will be no easy feat on June 6.
