George Russell has said Red Bull is now “the team to beat” in Formula 1 after Max Verstappen secured his second grand prix victory in a row at Sunday’s Singapore Grand Prix.
Verstappen’s win in Singapore followed a sprint victory on the same circuit on Saturday and his first grand prix victory of 2026 last weekend at the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia.
Mercedes’ strong start to the season means Russell’s teammate Kimi Antonelli looks destined to win the drivers’ title this season while the German manufacturer has a comfortable margin in the constructors’ standings.
But Russell, who finished ninth in Singapore after starting 19th with an engine penalty, believes Verstappen’s performance at the last three rounds means Red Bull has surpassed Mercedes as the best team on the grid.
“I think the main thing for us as a team is to try and understand how we’re going to find more performance because the performance of Red Bull has been very impressive the last three weeks on three very different circuits and you know right now they are the team to beat,” Russell said.
“The goal right now is we need to understand how to get more out of this [upgrade] package. Kimi ran it, the numbers say it’s performing as we expect but obviously the lap times haven’t been that great so we need to try and understand how to make that work.”
Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff also praised Red Bull’s improvement in the second half of the year and believes they will be a title challenger in 2027.
“Really, you need to take your hat off of what Red Bull has done this season, how they have developed the car and how it’s all come together as a package,” Wolff said.
“And then you put Max Verstappen in the car and when he feels that this thing is driving like he wants it to drive, then these are the results. He’s been by far the quickest guy today. He’s been the quickest guy in Kuala Lumpur.
“Let’s see when our upgrade hopefully starts to work and land in a place where we think it should be, whether we can be competitive against him. But one thing is for sure, next year it’s a full-on fight between the teams and Red Bull is part of that.”