Marko: "Currently, McLaren is the leading force"

Although the season hasn't even started yet, more and more voices in the industry are drawing attention to the fact that defending champion Red Bull Racing will have a long way to climb in the individual World Championship.

Red Bull itself does not deny this, quite the opposite. Of course, now people will comment nonsense like "they're just putting us to sleep" and so on, but the truth is that a characteristic has emerged during the tests. This does not bode well for Max Verstappen's success regarding the Australian Grand Prix. Helmut Marko also acknowledged this in an interview, emphasizing that although they have made progress compared to 2024, the others have made even more:

"Currently, the favorite is clearly McLaren. It has become evident during the tests that they have strengthened significantly in both single laps and longer stints, not to mention tire wear. Nevertheless, their dominance cannot be considered alarming, especially given the weather conditions during the first kilometers covered.

It would be difficult to predict the exact power ranking, but I believe that this year, four teams could be in competition with each other. I'm talking about the same four teams that dominated the field last year, but I envision a stronger fight." - said Helmut Marko.

We would just add that if it turns out this way, we wouldn't mind at all!

Photo: Autoracing1