Red Bull team boss Christian Horner says Max Verstappen has dealt with recent disappointment "incredibly well" and has tipped the Dutch youngster to fight back in the second half of the 2017 Formula 1 season.
Verstappen's season started well, with a podium in China contributing to a points tally of 35 across the opening four races, 13 more than team-mate Daniel Ricciardo had scored over the same period, but things began to go downhill from there, as the 19-year-old scored only ten points in the next five races thanks to a run of poor reliability and incidents.
Ricciardo meanwhile finished on the podium in all five of those races, even winning in Azerbaijan, to extend his lead over Verstappen by 50 points heading into the summer break.
"Daniel has had a great run, but obviously a grand prix victory is always special, no matter how they come," commented Horner on the team's season so far. "Obviously we got a little bit lucky on that day but it was great to see Daniel win the race.
"But races such as China, which was very good with Max, and Austria, where Daniel was under huge pressure, the same in Montreal, we've had some great races."
Horner has tipped Verstappen to bounce back from his disappointing opening half.
"To be taken out in Barcelona, through no fault of his own, to have had successive engine failures in Montreal and Baku, where he was in a position to certainly finish on the podium if not win the grand prix was immensely frustrating.
"But he has dealt with it incredibly well and I'm certain that after the summer break he is going to have a strong second half of the year."
