The Dutchman has suffered bad getaways in the last three races, which have left him off the podium since the summer break while teammate Daniel Ricciardo has been able to challenge Mercedes.

Following investigations back at the Red Bull factory about what has been going wrong, Verstappen says that mechanical tweaks made to the clutch of his RB12 should help improve things from this weekend's Malaysian GP.

"We tried to check everything and I think for the moment, I think we have an answer on it – but we have to check it on track to make it a more stable clutch," he said.

"The reasons each time are different, but of course a lot of work has been done, especially after Singapore.

"One bad start is okay, two bad starts is getting the limit, but three in a row is not great. But I've been on top of it, the team has been on top of it and hopefully we have fixed it now for this race."

Verstappen insists that the issues have not been related to things he has done ahead of the starts – so there is no need for him to change how he deals with things inside the car.

"It is mainly parts. But this inconsistency makes it difficult for your reference to know what you have to do, so it makes it sometimes very hard to combine those things," he said.

Verstappen also suggested that the start in Singapore was probably hampered because he was mindful before the race that there could be a problem after Red Bull detected issues with his clutch on Saturday night.

"You try to correct it but it doesn't help," he said. "If you go to the start and nobody told you the clutch had an issue, then you do your normal start.

"But if you come already from two bad starts and they tell you, 'you will have another difficult start', it is hard. And it just compromises your whole race.

"Even in Monza, it compromised my race. There you can still overtake, you have the straights. But in Singapore it is very hard. It is a bit like Monaco. It is all about qualifying and then you do your race."

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