The 2021 championship contender was heard regularly complaining ab🌟out the balance of his Red Bull over team radio throughout Friday’s pair of 60-minute practice sessions as he struggled to match the pace of title ri🅷val Lewis Hamilton. 

Verstappen wound up over four-tenths adrift of Hamilton in opening pr꧅actice before the Dutchman fell to fifth in tཧhe afternoon, finishing the day some six-tenths behind the timesheet-topping Mercedes. 

In FP2, Versta♊ppen reported he was getting “weird snaps” and that his RB16B car felt “like a slingsho♊t” at mid-corner. 

Speaking to Sky after the conclusion of Friday’s on-track running, Red Bull team principal Christian H♊orner confirmed Verstappen’s day was hampered by a balance problem. 

“We’ve got a li𝔉ttle bit of a balance mish-mash at the moment,” Horner said. 

“The circuit is a lot gr📖ippier than it was last year, I think we’re just a little bit out of the window with Max on set-up. 

“So it’s going toജ be a busy night, burning the midnight oil with the mechanics, and no doubt back in Milton Keynes as well.” 

Asked if he is confident the issue can be rectified in time for final practice and qualifying on Saturday, Horner said: “I think so - I think it’s j🌸ust understanding the issue. 

“We know we’ve got a g💝ood car, it’s just gettingꦜ into that window and I don’t think we hit that today.” 

Having made changes to try and counter his understeer problems in FP1, Verstappen then ended up suffering𒉰 fr🍸om oversteer in the second session. 

Verstappen admitted the set-up changes had notܫ helped and predicted a long night ahead to try and get꧃ on top of his issues around Istanbul Park. 

“We tried a few things compared t𒈔o FP1, but also FP1 wasn’t th🌜at great,” he explained. 

“So we’re still looking around a bit at what to do. It’s a bit different here, we don’t have a lot of data with these kind of cars so yeah, we have a bit of an evening ahe♎ad to make it a bit better because today wasn’t the best of days. 

“Hopefully of course it will improve, otherwise it’s not looking too good. But we’ll see 𒐪what we can do ꧂overnight.” 

Verstappen comes into the🐷 weekend trialing Hamilton by just two points in the world championship, but his main riva🌌l will be hit with a 10-place demotion for changing onto his fourth engine of the year. 

However, Verstappen is finding no com♑fort from Hamilton’s situation and insisted Red Bull can only focus on what is in its cꦦontrol. 

“We have to focus on ourselves and today wasn’t that good,”🍌 he added. “So we’ll wor🍸k on that.”