Verstappen ‘didn’t leave anything on the table’ as he explains ‘limitations’ after P7 in Zandvoort Qualifying

Max Verstappen was confident that he had not “left anything on the table” in Qualifying for the Dutch Grand Prix, with the Red Bull driver having to settle for P7 after experiencing “limitations” in the car.

Having ended the Sprint in sixth earlier in the day, Verstappen tried to give his home fans something to cheer about during the afternoon’s running but was unable to match the pace of McLaren, Mercedes and Ferrari, putting him in seventh place for Sunday’s race.

While he looked to be closer to the front than he had been in SQ3 on Friday, the four-time World Champion conceded that he was disappointed by the gap that remained.

“Unfortunately the car didn’t really change a lot, so I just had the same balance limitations as I had yesterday,” said Verstappen.

“There was not a lot more in it, to be honest. I didn’t really feel like I left anything on the table, it’s just not where I wanted to be.”

In terms of whether the team need to wait for more updates to try and move nearer to their rivals – or if more can still be extracted from their current package – the Dutchman added: “I think some fundamental things in the car hopefully we can fix for next year.

“The rest is maybe trying, of course, to find a bit more performance, but we’ll see in the coming races.”

Verstappen will be joined on the fourth row of the grid by the other Red Bull of Liam Lawson, with the New Zealander left feeling positive about the steps he has taken as he continues to deputise for the injured Isack Hadjar.

“It was good,” Lawson commented following his P8 result. “It was an improvement from yesterday, just putting everything together. To get to that point in Quali is good.

“I mean, overall we wanted probably more from the car, but obviously my only reference at the moment is Max. I’ve just been trying to get closer through the weekend, and I feel like, honestly, I did a good lap.

“Overall happy, happy with that side of it. Obviously tomorrow we need to try and stay here at least.”

Quizzed on what he would deem as a success in Sunday's Grand Prix, Lawson explained: “I mean, at least staying where we are – that would be really, really good.

“Trying to move forward as well if the opportunity’s there. Obviously I’m still learning this car in the race [trim]. Today [in the Sprint] was quite tricky. I have a bit of data to review to try and help that.”