Max Verstappen: Why the Red Bull driver will never change the way he races

New York Times

2 days ago

'I get really tired of all the comments saying I should change my approach. I will never do that, because it brought me to where I am right now.'
That quote from Max Verstappen, given at the 2018 Canadian Grand Prix when he was 20 years old, feels as relevant today as it did then.
His comment came in response to questions about a string of crashes and incidents he'd experienced at the start of that season, his fourth F1 campaign. At the previous race in Monaco, he'd blown a chance at victory with a crash in final practice that prevented him from taking part in qualifying. Red Bull teammate Daniel Ricciardo went on to win the famous grand prix instead. In the same answer, Verstappen warned that he was so tired of questions about his approach, 'If I get any more, I might headbutt someone.'
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In the seven years that have passed since Verstappen made those comments, a lot has changed.
He's become a four-time world champion, including the most dominant title win in F1 history in 2023, and moved into the upper-echelons of the record books. Even at 27, he's in the conversation among F1's all-time greats.
Yet Verstappen's aggressive approach to racing has never wavered, the most recent example coming in Spain on Sunday when he appeared to deliberately run into the side of George Russell's Mercedes. It resulted in Verstappen receiving a time penalty while also putting himself on the verge of a one-race ban, both of which dealt blows to his increasingly fragile hopes of winning a fifth successive championship in 2025.
In the race's immediate aftermath, Verstappen didn't want to talk about the incident — just once referring to it as a 'misjudgment.' Only Russell publicly called out the collision for being a seemingly deliberate act when speaking after the race. Red Bull F1 chief, Christian Horner, McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, the race winner, and Russell's own team principal at Mercedes, Toto Wolff, all felt more context was needed to understand what Verstappen did.
On Monday morning, Verstappen posted on Instagram that the collision with Russell was 'not right' and 'shouldn't have happened,' citing the tire choice and other driver moves on-track as having 'fuelled my frustration.' But it was not an outright apology for what happened.
That still stood out for being the closest Verstappen has come to acknowledging his responsibility in an incident through his F1 career, a sign of his evolution from a young upstart in F1 to a four-time world champion. A huge change that brings with it added expectations. But at no point has that blunted Verstappen's hard, no-holds-barred stance against rivals on the track in pretty much every season he has competed at the front of the pack.
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Verstappen brushed off his incident-laden start to 2018 in Canada with the infamous headbutt quote, despite Horner encouraging a 'modified' approach. Later that year in Brazil, Verstappen reacted angrily after Esteban Ocon spun him while trying to unlap himself, costing the Red Bull driver a surefire victory.
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After they got out of their cars, Verstappen shoved Ocon in the FIA garage, resulting in two days of community service being issued by F1's governing body that he eventually served at a Formula E race in Morocco. But Verstappen later claimed it was 'quite a calm response,' adding: 'What do you expect me to do — shake his hand (and say) thank you very much for being second instead of first?'
The greatest scrutiny on Verstappen's racing approach came through his intense title fight against Lewis Hamilton in 2021. The margins that year were so fine that one corner or battle often ended up deciding a race outcome.
Verstappen squeezed Hamilton at Imola in a first taste of what was to come, but Hamilton was then blamed for being chiefly responsible for their collision at Silverstone that resulted in a high-speed crash for Verstappen. Hamilton went on to win the race despite a time penalty, while Red Bull was unsuccessful in arguing with the FIA that he should have been given a harsher sanction — even going as far as getting then-reserve driver Alex Albon to recreate the lines of the cars during a private test.
A crash at Monza eliminated both Verstappen and Hamilton, when Verstappen tried ambitiously to hold the outside line at the first chicane, only to run out of road and lose control over the curb before the cars collided, the Red Bull ended up on top of the Mercedes. Without the halo, Verstappen's car would have landed on Hamilton's head.
Verstappen's immediate response was to point the finger at Hamilton, saying on the radio: 'That's what you get when you don't leave a space.' Horner deemed it a racing incident, but the stewards disagreed, putting full blame on Verstappen and giving him a grid penalty for the next race that was made redundant by a drop for a Red Bull's pre-planned engine change.
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Then came Saudi Arabia, the penultimate race of the 2021 season, where Verstappen made multiple lunges to stay ahead of Hamilton, and then slowed suddenly — similar to Spain with Russell — appearing to try and give the place back, resulting in contact. He also attempted a dive-bomb move (an ambitious overtake from distance) on Hamilton on the opening lap of their Abu Dhabi title decider, forcing Hamilton to go off-track to avoid a collision. Verstappen would, of course, go on to win the title after race director Michael Masi's fumbling of the rulebook, passing Hamilton with fresh tires on the final lap that should not have been taken under a green flag.
Through 2022, and especially 2023, Verstappen's elbows-out approach to racing cooled somewhat. Red Bull's pace advantage through this phase was such that he didn't need to do everything to win the race in an instant — he could bide his time. The car was so quick, he'd generally win eventually.
But the pressure applied by Norris and McLaren through 2024 brought back some of Verstappen's old racing tactics, notably in Austin — when Norris got a penalty for passing Verstappen off the track, the Red Bull having been ahead at the apex and technically entitled to the corner — and Mexico, where Verstappen got penalties for two incidents on the same lap when he ran Norris off the road to try and stay ahead.
It sparked calls from most drivers to review F1's racing rules, but Verstappen and Red Bull again saw nothing wrong in these actions. Horner arrived at his post-race media session in Mexico with telemetry data in defense of Verstappen, while Verstappen said he wouldn't share his opinion, nor change his approach.
Mexico was the closest Norris came to really pushing back against Verstappen, a driver he has long admired and shares a good relationship with, by calling him 'dangerous' on the radio. He also claimed post-race that Verstappen would 'sacrifice himself' to win the championship.
On Sunday in Spain, Norris described Verstappen's move on Russell as being like 'Mario Kart' in the drivers' cool-down room, but didn't want to comment on it otherwise when speaking to reporters.
The main voice to speak up against Verstappen's on-track moves has been Mercedes driver Russell when, in Qatar last year, he claimed Verstappen had threatened to 'put me on my f—ing head in the wall' for his role in getting Verstappen a grid penalty.
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Verstappen later denied he'd said that to Russell and that the Briton was 'exaggerating.' Russell was clearly emotional when delivering his comments in a small media roundtable, which included The Athletic, once race later in Abu Dhabi last year, saying that 'people have been bullied by Max for years now.'
Whenever Verstappen's racing approach has been broached with Horner, he has typically always lauded his driver's commitment to hard racing, and suggest that his competitors know what they're getting into when going wheel-to-wheel with the Dutchman. While that may be true, it does not equate to a free pass to act however he pleases on the track — Spain being proof that there will be consequences for crossing a line, particularly if it ends up leading to a race ban down the line.
But it is an insight into Verstappen's champion's mindset. By believing the knives are being sharpened to get you, it makes you lift your own performance in response.
'There's a pattern that the great ones, whether it's in motor racing or in other sports, you just need to have the world against you, and then perform at the highest possible levels,' Mercedes team boss Wolff said on Sunday after the race in Spain. 'That's why sometimes these greats don't recognize that actually the world is not against you, you have made a mistake, or you have screwed up.'
The same was true for drivers such as Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna, both of whom have highly questionable on-track actions as context when their greatness is discussed. They had a total belief they were in the right — the trophies and championships acting as justification for it all being worthwhile, including times they deliberately crashed into rivals. A win-at-all-costs approach is admirable in some respects, as sporting success will trump everything when it comes to writing a legacy. But sometimes, there will be a price to pay for it.
Privately in Barcelona, Verstappen did recognize that cost. After completing all of his post-race media duties and returning to Red Bull's engineering suite for the team's typical post-race debrief, Verstappen immediately apologized for what happened with Russell. He cares deeply about his fellow team members, understanding the lengths they go to for him to be fighting for wins and championships. Costing them a result would have been what hurt him the most.
But as Verstappen said back in 2018, his way of going racing got him to exactly this point —a four-time world champion and the greatest of his generation. He wouldn't change a thing in this journey.
So don't expect him to change going forward.