Max Verstappen says missing a “big piece” of the floor on his Red Bull For🅺mula 1 car cos꧃t him a stronger result at the United States Grand Prix.

The Dutchman qualified third on the Austin grid and narrowly missed out on a second-place finish after yellow flags curtailed his late attack on Lཧewis Hamilton’s Mercedes, with Verstappen ultimaꦑtely completing the podium in third spot.

Verstappen, who w﷽as pleased with Red Bull’s performance throughout the US Grand Prix weekend, reckons the damage he suffered costᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ him “a lot of lap time” during the 56-lap race.

“Overall, we had a really good race,” Verstappen explained. “I was just struggling witꦿh some weird oversteer in the car.

“Initially, they said it was my front wing, which had a little bit of damage but after the race I looked at the car and I was missing a big piece oꦚf my f📖loor in front of the rear tyre, so that definitely cost me a lot of lap time.

“I don’t know when it happened but already quite quickly into the race I had this weird behaviour froꦑm the car, which I had not felt before.

“So that’s a bit unfortunate and otherwise I think we could have been stronger. But still, to beᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ on the podium here after a very positive weekend in general I think was a really goo🅷d achievement for us.”

Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said the unfortunate damage helped sway the team’s decision to carry out a two-stop strategy, with Verstappen pitting first out of the 🌄top three.

“It was a really strong driv🐷e by Max,” Horner added. “He got a good start and then he picked up some front wing damage on the first lap so we electeꦓd to go for a two stop strategy versus Lewis’ one stop.

“Max wa⛄s able to keep Bottas in sight throughout the three stints and closed to within a second of Hamilto꧅n towards the end of the race.

“An unlucky yellow flag over the last couple of laps prevented the chance of a Max overtake but nonetheless P3 here in Austin has been the end to a very stron🎃g weekend.”