Laurent Mekis: The team exceeded all my expectations

      Laurent Mekies, in an interview with Racer, acknowledged that the Red Bull Racing team, which he has been leading for just a year, has surprised him multiple times during this period and exceeded all his expectations.

      Laurent Mekies: "The first year in this position feels like a roller coaster. I won’t hide it; working at Red Bull Racing is a real privilege... I remember well that in 2025, both Pierre Waché (Technical Director) and the entire team were not going to give up; they did not want to accept that last year's car was not competitive enough.

      They had every reason to leave that situation in the past, as the transition to a new technical regulation was approaching, we were supposed to get new engines, and now the team principal had changed. It would have been easy to admit that the car wasn’t working, and we would deal with all the problems by next year.

      But no one wanted to do that; gradually, a new approach to the chassis was found, and it turned out to be the right one. Through joint efforts, and not without the help of the miracles that Max performed behind the wheel, we managed to catch up."

      Speaking about the transition to in-house engines built by the Red Bull Powertrains (RBPT) division, Mekies also emphasized that it was an incredibly complex task:

      "This was the craziest project we were working on... But at Red Bull, everything is always done our way. We tackle what seems impossible. This decision was made by the shareholders and the company’s management, for which a group of incredibly talented specialists was assembled, led by Ben Hodgkinson (Technical Director of RBPT), and for the past four years, they worked in the shadows.

      It can be acknowledged that during the winter, we had gloomy thoughts because if it turned out that something was wrong with the power unit, the team would be uncompetitive for two or three seasons... But already at the preseason tests, we felt that everything was going well, and when we saw how harmoniously the RBPT engine engineers and the chassis engineers interacted, we felt incredible joy.

      Don’t get me wrong: a lot of things didn’t work as they should, and not everything was at the required level, but despite this, we felt that we were almost capable of fighting for good results. And when we got to Melbourne, there were no gloomy thoughts anymore...

      But now the team is doing a great job of upgrading the technology, and this process is moving incredibly fast. Half a season is behind us, but we have already made up a significant portion of the gap that existed at the beginning of the championship. Probably, compared to the pace of the leaders, we are only 0.3 seconds slower.

      At the same time, we fully understand that making up those 0.3 seconds will be the hardest part, and only time will tell if we can do it. But we must give credit to our technical specialists: thanks to their efforts, in just a few months, we have returned to a normal level where we are capable of fighting for podiums, and soon we will also be contending for victories.

      I believe the team has exceeded both my expectations and the expectations of many others. I must say that even in the most challenging moments – and I can only speak about the last 12 months – our engine engineers never doubted that they could handle it. I don’t think that next year we will be lagging behind Mercedes, McLaren, or Ferrari. This means that all four teams will have roughly equal chances for the title."