Horner promises "a lot of late nights" for Red Bull during the long break until Austin

On the back of a series of tough races, Red Bull team boss Christian Horner has promised that the Milton Keynes-based outfit will have lots of "late nights" in the coming weeks in a bid to regain its form from the early stages of the season.

Having struggled for pace in recent rounds, reigning champion Max Verstappen returned to the podium, securing a second place for Red Bull. The result also meant that the Dutchman is yet to win at the Marina Bay Circuit, while his second place also saw his current winless streak extend to eight Grands Prix.

Reflecting on the race, Horner said that McLaren's pace meant that the Dutch driver was unable to hope for a better result than a second place at the Marina Bay Circuit.

"First off, congratulations to McLaren and Lando, they were clearly the best car on track today. The gap to Lando was significant in the first part of the race, and on the hard tyre we looked in better shape, but the gap was too big and this track is historically very hard to overtake on.

"Max drove a strong race today and P2 was what we had. If you consider where we were a few weeks ago the progress is visible, and we have the better part of a month to put our heads down and make some progress before we head to Austin.

"There will be a lot of late nights in Milton Keynes. As a Team, we wanted to avoid a repeat of last year in Singapore, and the effort that went in to preparing for this race resulted in giving the drivers a better car and more confidence in the direction of development.

Asked to comment on Perez's race in Singapore, Horner has revealed that the Mexican driver struggled for traction which meant that he could not execute the key overtaking manoeuvres that would have been necessary to make real progress through the field.

"Checo unfortunately struggled to overtake during the race, he didn’t feel like he had traction in key parts of the track, and P10 is what he could manage today.

"The McLaren is the benchmark car at the moment and we have a bit to catch up to at the moment, but we have the people, the ability, and the drive to do just that. We are still in the fight, and now have a few weeks to work on things before we go again."