After an unexpected but brilliant victory in Japan last week, things took a turn for the worse for Max Verstappen and Red Bull at this weekend's Bahrain Grand Prix.

Verstappen could only finish sixth, and even that came after a late overtake on Pierre Gasly. His teammate Yuki Tsunoda picked up a couple of points in ninth place, but overall, it was a disappointing weekend for the team.

The Dutchman’s race got off to a tough start. He was passed by Esteban Ocon, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, and Lewis Hamilton, dropping him down to ninth. Later, he switched from hard tyres to used mediums, which helped him move back up the field, but he still finished over 30 seconds behind race winner Oscar Piastri in the McLaren. Red Bull also had problems in the pit stops, with both drivers losing time due to issues with the pit lights and slow tyre changes.

After the race, Red Bull held an urgent meeting at the track with key team members, including team principal Christian Horner, advisor Helmut Marko, technical director Pierre Wache and chief engineer Paul Monaghan. According to reports, the meeting was called on the spot in Red Bull’s hospitality area to quickly address what went wrong and how to prevent it from happening again.

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Helmut Marko, quoted by Motorsport.com, described the situation as “a very difficult day for Red Bull,” saying: “That’s obvious to all of us. We have to get, as soon as possible, performance in the car again, and also standards like a pitstop have to work. The car is not the fastest and then the pitstops are not working. That is not acceptable.”

He admitted that the car had several issues. “We have a lot of problems. The main problem is balance and grip. And out of this, so I guess the problems with the brakes came up. And then the normal procedure like a pitstop is not working, so one [issue] comes after the other.”

When asked by how serious the situation was, he replied: “Very alarming. We know that we are not competitive, and there will be parts coming in the coming races, and hopefully they bring improvement.”

Verstappen echoed these concerns, telling reporters: “Everything went wrong that could go wrong. The pace was very bad. We have our problems, and even if you win a race, that doesn’t make them disappear. We just keep talking and trying to improve.”

With pressure building, Red Bull now hopes that upcoming updates to the RB21 will help solve the car’s deeper performance problems. The team will need to bounce back quickly if it wants to stay in the title fight this season.