Outnumbered all season: Max Verstappen's missing team-mate will shape Abu Dhabi F1 finale

Max Verstappen goes into this weekend’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix finale having fought his way back into the 2025 F1 title picture almost entirely on his own.

That’s no slight on his driving. He’s done what the greats do and taken the fight to McLaren whenever the car and circuit suited him, but across a season of tense championship permutations he has been deprived of the second-car support that can act as a buffer, or a tactical foil to blunt McLaren’s two-car assault.

The situation is not entirely new, as Verstappen has always operated on a different competitive plane from his team-mates, but in the past, Sergio Pérez at least played a role occasionally, contributing with some wins, defensive drives or strategic cover when the team leader needed it.

In 2025, even that occasional assistance vanished. Red Bull has effectively gone through a title fight with only one car capable of competing at the front.

Verstappen has not only sustained his title challenge until the very final race, but his points tally alone has been enough to outscore Ferrari ahead of the finale.

Going into the Abu Dhabi weekend, he faces a three-way scrap for the title with Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, but he does so without a consistent, front-running team-mate to swing the tide when he needs it most.

Verstappen needs to outscore Norris by 13 points to take the crown, meaning that even if he wins the race, he still requires two cars between him and his McLaren rival. To avoid the risk of team orders bringing Norris back into play, those two cars would ideally not be McLarens.

Mercedes might be able to ‘help’ Verstappen, although it hasn’t been too strong in recent Abu Dhabi events. Ferrari is an even more unlikely candidate given its recent form, and unless some other team springs a real surprise, that’s pretty much where the list ends.

All that aside, Verstappen would require Yuki Tsunoda to suddenly find the form he has been missing all year and insert himself in between the McLarens, or at least be a factor in making the lives of Norris and Piastri more difficult.

For Tsunoda, it would be a great send-off in his final race with Red Bull, but he has a sixth place as his best finish so far this year, so chances are he won’t be able to help his team-mate directly.

Tsunoda has shown flashes of promise but never delivered the sustained pace needed of a true wingman. His qualifying deficits and race inconsistencies meant Verstappen has always gone into Sundays outnumbered.

In a championship where a handful of points can swing the entire narrative, the absence of a team-mate who can cap McLaren’s scoring or split its drivers has mattered enormously.

Red Bull’s decision to promote Isack Hadjar for 2026 is a tacit admission that this year’s experiment simply didn’t deliver the two-car strength the team needed.

Where Verstappen could have used help

There are several races that underline how much difference a proper second Red Bull might have made.

Suzuka was the first example, although it was also Tsunoda’s first race with Red Bull, so expecting him to be close to Verstappen, who put on an incredible drive, would have been too optimistic.

Verstappen took pole and won the race, but both McLarens finished right behind him – Norris second, Piastri third. Red Bull had one car in the fight; McLaren had two.

Had Verstappen enjoyed a team-mate capable of running in that group, Red Bull could have used a running-in-between tactic: defending to hold up one McLaren, forcing the rivals into different pit windows, or simply occupying a track position that would have made McLaren’s race management harder.

Instead, Verstappen had to control both McLarens by himself on track and in the pits.

Imola told much the same story. Verstappen again led home the field while the two McLarens completed the podium.

Monza was one of the best opportunities for Verstappen to put cars between himself and Norris, as the Dutchman won by nearly 20 seconds from the McLarens. Instead, Verstappen finished nearly a full lap ahead of Tsunoda.

Verstappen then won in Austin by eight seconds from Norris, with Tsunoda 52 seconds adrift.

Then came Qatar, which provided the most tactical illustration.

McLaren’s strategy gamble backfired and handed Verstappen a crucial victory, but a second Red Bull could have given him the leverage to punish his rivals even further.

During the safety-car sequence and the pitstop reshuffles, having another Red Bull able to pressure Piastri or Norris – or simply inherit a position and hold it – could have significantly altered the strategic permutations.

Verstappen still profited from McLaren’s error, but he did so once again as a lone wolf.

And while it’s impossible to put an exact number on the points lost, even conservative scenarios — where a second Red Bull would have inserted itself between Verstappen and one McLaren, or denied a McLaren a podium  — suggest Verstappen could easily have gained an additional 10–20 points across the season.

Red Bull’s endemic problem

Verstappen didn’t get much help from his team-mates to secure his first four titles, but 2025 has highlighted the flaws in its system like few years had before.

Liam Lawson was demoted after just two races, and Tsunoda’s big promotion has ended up costing him his drive and perhaps even a future in F1.

Next year is also a gamble as the team waits to see if the faith it’s putting on Hadjar pays off.

That means Red Bull’s line-up has continued to be in flux, still unsure of having a driver able to match Verstappen’s consistency or race craft.

It may not have been such a big issue in the past, but 2025 has exposed a truth long known inside top teams: in a tight title fight, a driver without a competitive team-mate is almost always fighting with one hand tied behind his back.

A team running two competitive cars creates headaches that go far beyond laptime. Rivals must account for blocked pit windows, split strategies, the risk of the undercut or overcut, and the tactical complexity of navigating two rival drivers.