Vettel’s ‘not real dominance’ verdict for McLaren as Red Bull lurks

McLaren is racing towards the Constructors’ title and a potential 1-2 in the Drivers’, but Sebastian Vettel says it’s “not real dominance” given Red Bull’s form, even today.

Heading into the final season of F1’s current ground-effect regulatory era, McLaren’s MCL39 is the car to beat with the team claiming seven of 10 Grand Prix victories.

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Building on last year’s success with the MCL38, with the team having unlocked the car’s potential through its Miami Grand Prix upgrade, McLaren is racing towards a first double since Mika Hakkinen’s 1998 World title.

There is, it could be said, one obstacle: Max Verstappen.

Although Red Bull’s RB21 is lacking balance and tyre wear compared to its McLaren counterpart, Verstappen has eked out two Grand Prix victories to sit third in the Drivers’ standings, where he’s 43 points off the pace set by Oscar Piastri.

Red Bull team principal Christian Horner is adamant the fight to have the Dutchman crowned a five-time World Champion is by no means over.

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“There’s still a significant points gap between us and them, but we don’t give up on anything,” he said. “We’re not even at the halfway point yet, so there’s a lot of racing, a lot of sprint races coming up.

“And if we can keep chipping away and getting performance on the car, then nobody gives up on anything.”

Vettel believes the possibility of Red Bull fighting back is very real.

“I think the favourites are Max, McLaren, and George [Russell] at the moment,” he told ORF’s podcast, Sport am Sonntag. “But they’re all very close together.

“I think the level is very high. And right now, even if McLaren is perhaps dominant, I don’t have a clear favourite yet.

“The season is still far too long and so much can still happen. And when everything is so close, fifth place can sometimes be very good, even if it might currently be considered a disaster, it can ultimately be very valuable.”

But should Verstappen miss out on the championship this season, it could be a one-off blip in his run as Formula 1 resets through the introduction of all-new cars and engines.

Although Red Bull’s RB22 will be the first Red Bull in 20 years designed without technical guru Adrian Newey’s input, Vettel believes his former F1 team has the know-how to see off talk of a McLaren era of dominance.

“There’s nothing to argue about why they can’t build the best car,” he said. “Red Bull is now very well positioned in terms of infrastructure and personnel.

“But you can see it now, sometimes it’s not just the infrastructure or personnel, but also the team structure, and that sometimes fluctuates.

“McLaren has had a very good run recently. How long that will last is unknown.

“It’s not real dominance in that sense yet. Red Bull is still, I think, the dominant force of the last few years, if you look at the current rules.

“Even if things are a bit more difficult right now, Max and the team somehow still manage not to be so far away from the top.”

For all the teams, F1 2026 isn’t just about understanding the technical regulations, there are also new engine rules in play as Formula 1 moves onto a 50/50 split between the ICE and electrical power.

That’s an added challenge for Red Bull as its own Red Bull Powertrains division is designing and building the engine for the first time, together with Ford.

“We don’t yet know how things will turn out this year,” said Vettel, “but it’s difficult to make a prediction for the next few years, because it’s certainly possible that things will turn out quite well with the new power unit and the switch to [their] own power unit.”