Red Bull’s 2024 season was full of ups and downs. While Max Verstappen secured his fourth Drivers’ Championship in a row, the team fell to third place in the Constructors’ standings—a big difference from its dominance in recent years.

The year started strong, with Verstappen winning four of the first five races. The RB20 looked unbeatable at that point. However, things took a turn mid-season when mistakes in car development caused serious balance problems. This made the car difficult to drive, and Verstappen, clearly frustrated, found himself in a close battle for the title with McLaren’s Lando Norris.

One of Red Bull’s biggest issues was the RB20’s inconsistency. It performed well only under very specific conditions, while McLaren’s MCL38 worked well on all types of tracks. This reliability helped McLaren finish ahead of Red Bull in the Constructors’ Championship, breaking the team’s streak of dominance under the current ground effect rules.

Late-season updates gave Verstappen the edge he needed to secure his Drivers’ title, but Red Bull couldn’t fully fix the car due to budget cap restrictions.

Team advisor Helmut Marko has now provided a few updates on the 2025 car and shared that Red Bull appears to have resolved its key weaknesses.

"I would say that the basic concept is ready," Marko told Sport1.de.

"The car is de facto finished and it is now going into final production. At that point you see how much weight can be saved.

"The task for the engineers was to build a car that has a wider working window. One that is not so critically on the limitthat it is very, very difficult for the drivers to control the car. 

"That means better predictability and, if possible, as McLaren has shown, that these performances are delivered on all tracks, not just on specific tracks."

He added: "And one of our big weaknesses was not being able to drive completely over the kerbs.

"There was that statement by Max that the car jumps like a kangaroo, and on certain tracks that cost us a lot of time.

"So we think these weaknesses have been fixed, but we will only really see that during the test in Bahrain."