The 2021 championship contender was heard regularly compl𒉰aining about the balance of his Red Bull over team radio throughout Friday’s pair oওf 60-minute practice sessions as he struggled to match the pace of title rival Lewis Hamilton. 

Verstappen wound up over four-tenths adrift of Hamilton in opening practice before the♕ Dutchman fell to fifth in the afternoon, finishing the day some six-tenths behind the timesheet-topping Mercedes. 

In FP2, Verstap🍷pen🔯 reported he was getting “weird snaps” and that his RB16B car felt “like a slingshot” at mid-corner. 

Speaking to Sky after the conclusion of Friday’s on-track running, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner confirmed Vers𒊎tappen’s day was hampered by a balance problem. 

“We’ve got a little bit of a balance mish-maജsh at the moment,” Horner said. 𝓡;

“The circuit is🐻 a lot grippier than it was last year, I think we’re just a little bit out of the window with Max on set-up. 

“So it’s going to beꦓ a busy night, burning the midnight oil with the mechanics, and no doubt back in Milton Keynes as well💃.” 

Asked if he is confident the issue can be rectified in time for final practice and qualifying on Saturday, Horner said: “I think so - I think it’s 🌳just understandin𝄹g the issue. 

“We know we’v🐟e got a good car, it’s just getting into that window and I don’t think we hit✤ that today.” 

Having made changes to try and counter h🍨is understeer problems꧑ in FP1, Verstappen then ended up suffering from oversteer in the second session. 

Verstappen admitted the set-up changꦏes had not helped and predicted a long night ahead to try and get on top of his issues around Istanbul Park. 

“We tried a few thingꩲs compared to FP1, but also FP1 wasn’t that great,” he explained. 

“So we’re sti🧔ll looking around a bit at what to do. It’s a bit different here, we don’t have a lot of data with these kind of cars so yeah, we have a bit of an evening ahead to make it a bit better because today wasn’t the best of days. 

“Hopefully of course it will impro🌼ve, otherwise it’s not looking too good. But we’ll see what we can do overnight.” 

Verstappen comes into the weekend trialing Ha🙈milton by just two points in the world championship, but his m𒈔ain rival will be hit with a 10-place demotion for changing onto his fourth engine of the year. 

However, Verstappen is finding no comfort from Hamilton’s situation and insisted Red Bull♍ can only focus on what is in its control🐓. 

“We have to focus on ourselves and todaꦯy wasn’t that good,” he added. “So we’ll work ꦜon that.”