21/10/2018
NEWS STORY
Having damaged his rear suspension and driveshaft after running over the kerbs at COTA yesterday, Red Bull has been forced to change the gearbox on Max Verstappen's car ahead of today's race.
The move means an automatic grid penalty which sees the youngster, who qualified 15th, now starting from 18th on the grid.
In the wake of his elimination from qualifying after the incident, the Red Bull driver admitted to being amazed by the damage done.
"Everybody was taking them," he said. "We drove like that the last two years and again today all was fine, so it is really unexpected.
"Everything was well within the limits of everything, so there was nothing crazy," he added. "As you can see, everyone else was doing it as well. So that is why we are a little bit amazed how it happened.
"In the race it should not be a problem," he insisted, "as you don't use that much of the track anyway for tyres and whatever. So it should be alright."
At the time the Dutchman was not sure if the gearbox on the car would need to be changed.
"If that is the case, then we take a penalty and we start a little bit further back but it is not going to change the world," he said.