Max Verstappen and Red Bull embark on new era
SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS – Max Verstappen and Red Bull seek a successful re-set of their season as they launch a new era at this weekend's Belgian Grand Prix, their first without Christian Horner in charge.
As Formula One resumes after a mini break, McLaren duo Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris intensify their duel to succeed the Dutchman as world champion.
While Norris seeks his third consecutive win in a bid to reduce teammate Piastri's eight-point lead, it will be Red Bull under the greatest scrutiny as they embark on a new adventure under Frenchman Laurent Mekies.
Never before has a Red Bull team raced without Horner, who was dismissed unexpectedly two weeks ago following 20 years of success, including guiding Verstappen to four consecutive world titles from 2021-2024.
His successor Mekies, promoted from junior team Racing Bulls, faces a daunting challenge – not only in keeping the team's focus and performance at the majestic high-speed circuit in the Ardennes, but in bringing stability to Red Bull after a stormy period.
Verstappen has been linked with a move to Mercedes for 2026 and, while Horner has remained silent since his bombshell exit, the champion has welcomed the arrival of Mekies, who has an engineering background and avoids confrontation and discord.
His appointment brings an end to 18 months of rumour and intrigue during which Horner was investigated for alleged inappropriate conduct, the team lost the constructors' title to McLaren and saw key staff members leave.
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'I was back at the factory last week to spend some time in the sim with the team,' said Verstappen in a team release that made no mention of Horner's departure.
'I'm looking forward to working closely with Laurent.
'Spa is a classic and always my favourite track on the calendar – a very old school circuit where you have to do everything right to get a good lap.
'I enjoy the high-speed corners such as Eau Rouge, the layout which is different to other circuits, and elevation changes that make the track more of a challenge to drive.'
After a desultory outing at Silverstone, where he finished fifth after starting from pole position, the Belgium-born Verstappen will enjoy returning to one of his 'home' events, hoping Mekies can rekindle the team's spark to bring him a fourth career win at Spa.
Mekies said he would spend his first weeks in the job 'meeting the guys and girls who do the magic behind the scenes...to try to understand this beautiful magic machine'.
His first test will be a Saturday morning sprint race.
A win for Verstappen would not be a huge surprise as the characteristics of the Ardennes track favour his car, but he remains a distant third in a title race led by the McLaren men whose intra-team scrap may be their undoing.
After his outburst at receiving a 10-second penalty at Silverstone, Piastri is expected to be in feisty mood going into the Belgian and Hungarian double-header that precedes the August 'summer holiday' and another close contest is in prospect.
Like Piastri, Mercedes' George Russell will revel in a chance to show his speed in the often changeable conditions, having been stripped of victory last year because his car was underweight.
Team boss Toto Wolff has said that Russell and Kimi Antonelli are Mercedes' first choice for next season, appearing to rule out any chance of Verstappen making the move despite the rumours.
Seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton won here last year, his 105th and last triumph – and he remains in search of his first podium with Ferrari who arrive in Belgium with intent and a major upgrade package.
Hamilton was fourth in his home British race, where Nico Hulkenberg claimed his first career podium at the 239th attempt to endorse Sauber's momentum this year before becoming the Audi works team next season. AFP, REUTERS
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CNA
an hour ago
- CNA
Commentary: Amid Kpod panic, let's not forget ‘regular' vapes are still dangerous
SINGAPORE: In recent months, Kpods - vape devices laced with an anaesthetic called etomidate - have dominated headlines in Singapore and around the world. Many of us have come across stories about teenagers turning into 'zombies' and behaving erratically. Parents have recounted tragic experiences of their children's addiction struggles. There have been calls for stricter regulations around the accessibility of Kpods, especially for young people. This has drawn increased public attention to the dangers of vaping, and rightfully so. But amid this intense focus on Kpods, it's worth considering if something larger is being overlooked. That is, the broader issue of vaping itself, which paved the way for Kpods in the first place. When one product becomes the face of the problem, there's a risk that others fade into the background. It is not hard to imagine how a young person might view Kpods as the extreme, and 'normal' vapes as an acceptable compromise. This division, whether conscious or subconscious, risks blunting the urgency around the vaping epidemic as a whole. STUDENTS USING AND SELLING VAPES Although vaping has always been banned in Singapore, products are still smuggled in. Despite tight border controls and stringent laws, the number of vaping offences has steadily increased. In the first half of 2025, more than 2,500 reports of vaping were made, nearly matching the full-year total of over 3,000 such incidents in 2024. Schools are reporting more students caught with vapes. Some teenagers are now not just users, but also sellers. Just last week (Jul 25), two teenagers approached a Primary 4 student from Fairfield Methodist School as he was walking home from school and tried to get him to buy a vape. In a separate case, a 15-year-old boy who was caught with vapes five times over a 10-month period was recently ordered by a court to be placed in a boys' home. In yet another case, a man was charged in July for manufacturing Kpods at home, the first case of its kind in Singapore. Police found 569 empty pod casings, 1,485 pod covers, 100 loose vape pods and disposable vapes in an HDB flat. The scale of the problem suggests a deeper issue than just breaking the law: Demand is growing, and supply chains are adapting. HEFTIER PENALTIES ARE ONLY PART OF THE SOLUTION Law enforcement has moved quickly. Singapore's plan to list etomidate as a Class C drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act is a necessary step. It gives law enforcement stronger grounds to impose heftier penalties for Kpod offences. But this is a game of whack-a-mole. A major driver of the Kpod scourge is relentless marketing on social media platforms such as Telegram. Vapes are aggressively marketed as trendy, harmless consumer products. While improving drug enforcement laws is important to stay ahead of these schemes, enforcement alone may not be enough. Part of the challenge lies in how vapes are distributed. They are small, easy to hide and hard to trace. Many are distributed through encrypted messaging apps, peer-to-peer networks, and even unwitting parents returning from overseas trips. This is why another layer is needed: One that educates people on the dangers of vaping and helps them take ownership of their well-being. One recent example is the vape bin initiative, which encourages users to surrender their vapes without fear of punishment. The idea is simple: Get harmful devices off the streets and into bins. Critics have asked why a vape user would not just toss the device down the rubbish chute if he or she truly wanted to quit vaping. Whether the vape is thrown into a rubbish chute or a vape bin is not the point. These initiatives are about fostering community cooperation. About telling people that there is no shame in their past actions and offering a public, deliberate first step to quit vaping. But these efforts can only succeed if backed by support structures such as public education, counselling and addiction recovery services. Teens who are vaping to cope with mental health issues, academic stress or social pressure are likely to respond more favourably to counselling and other rehabilitative programmes than the stick. It is worth noting that a similar, albeit smaller, initiative was launched in November 2023 by the MacPherson Youth Network and Bilby Community Development, calling for youths aged 12 to 30 to surrender their vapes to receive a S$30 gift voucher for shops like Decathlon and Sephora. Whether such financial incentives are enough to motivate quitting is unclear. A more effective long-term approach would focus on helping vape-addicted youths address the underlying issues that compel them to vape in the first place. THERE IS NO 'SAFE' VAPE As public discussions on Kpods continue, it is important to remember this: All forms of vaping come with serious health risks. There is no 'safe' vape. The authorities are rightly cracking down on Kpods, but that attention should serve to open up the conversation, not narrow it. Kpods may be the latest concern, but they are part of a much larger and evolving landscape. The more we talk openly about the risks, the more we can prevent harm before it starts.

Straits Times
5 hours ago
- Straits Times
McLaren must also deal with disappointment amid runaway success
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CNA
5 hours ago
- CNA
McLaren must also deal with disappointment amid runaway success
LONDON :McLaren boss Zak Brown is preparing to deal with disappointment at the end of the Formula One season, even as the team enjoy one of their most dominant years and a 200th grand prix win at the weekend. As the title battle between Oscar Piastri and teammate Lando Norris heats up, the McLaren pair separated by just nine points after Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix, the American conceded he was thinking also about how to handle the aftermath. Red Bull's reigning champion Max Verstappen, the McLaren drivers' closest rival, is now 97 points off the pace and told reporters at the weekend that he may not win again this year given his car's issues. Even before the weekend, both Piastri and Norris cast caution aside and called it a two-horse race. One of them will surely end the year celebrating a dream come true. The other will rue what might have been, with a new engine era next season shaking everything up again and chances potentially disappearing. Losing always hurts, doubly so when it is to a teammate with the same car, and Brown said McLaren would have to deal with the situation sensitively when - although he still insisted on saying if - the time came. "Eventually... we'll just sit down and actually have a conversation and go 'right, one of you is going to win and it's going to be the best day of your life. One of you is going to lose. How do you want us to handle that?'," he told a select group of reporters. "We'll actually sit down and go 'Right, you want us to jump up and down and celebrate? This guy won'. So we're fully aware and sensitive to 'how do you celebrate that situation?'." Australian Piastri has won six races to Norris's five but the Briton has momentum going into the August break, with three wins from his last four starts. The pair have had seven one-two finishes from 14 races, including the last four, and have left rivals trailing. McLaren are so far ahead in the constructors' standings - 299 points over Ferrari - that the crown is a given. Much has been made of the potential for a falling out between friends, for clashes on track given what is at stake, but Brown was sanguine and said the relationship was only growing stronger. When Norris ran into the back of Piastri as he challenged for the lead in Canada in June, the Briton defused the situation by immediately taking responsibility. Piastri locked up behind Norris in Hungary on Sunday, in what could have been a repeat of that Montreal accident, but no contact was made. Brown said there was no 'elephant in the room' at McLaren, with the drivers having complete transparency on strategy and how the team go about racing, and he expected more close calls in future. "There's competitiveness brewing... as the championship builds, I'm sure that tension will grow," said the boss. "We're fully anticipating them 'swapping paint' again at some point, I'm very confident it won't be deliberate, which is where you then get into the problems. "They will have racing incidents in their further time here at McLaren, we know that and they know that, so we're not afraid of that.