Max Verstappen's Champion Veneer Is Wearing Thin

The Dutch 26-year-old three-time Formula 1 World Champion is going through it, and a weekend that included multiple shitty childish calls to his team, more complaints about his Red Bull car, and excuse after excuse for breaking series rules and colliding with competitors. The old Max is back, including an on-track contretemps with Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes. It’s 2021 all over again! Many F1 pundits have considered Max a more mature version during the 2022 and 2023 seasons, as he seemed calmer and more focused, but when Max doesn’t have a clear two-second advantage over the field, he reverts to his old erratic and tantrum-prone style. The kid is washed.

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Maybe Max was just tired from staying up until 3 a.m. the night before a Grand Prix to play video games (sim racing in the 24 Hours of Spa virtual event) or the pressure of McLaren’s rapid pace and serious improvement is cracking his foundation. In any case, Max was quite visibly rattled from the start of the race.

After being outqualified by both McLaren rivals, Max got a good start at the start of the race, but tried to force his way around the outside of a three-car-wide battle, and went off the track in the process. His pass of eventual-race-winner Oscar Piastri happened off the track, and despite that being against the rules, but was reticent to give the place back. Following that incident he said “OK, so you can just drive people off the track then? You can tell the FIA that’s how we’re going to race from now onwards. Just driving people off the road.” My guy, you already race that way, and you always have.

Later in the race a pass executed on Lewis Hamilton saw Max run long in the braking zone and suffer understeer. He immediately jumped on the radio and shouted down his team for giving him a shitty car. Later, after being chided for running too hard on fresh tires and not giving them the “gentle introduction” that current spec Pirellis require, he shouted back “No, mate. Don’t give me that shit. You guys gave me this fucking strategy, OK? I’m trying to rescue what’s left. Fuck!”

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A handful of laps later Max chucked his car down the inside at turn one, locking up and collecting Lewis Hamilton’s right front wheel. The impact sent him skyward, and it was pure luck that his car didn’t disintegrate after all four wheels leapt off the tarmac and slammed back down. It was later shown that he was carrying more speed into the corner thanks to DRS, while Hamilton was on exactly the same racing line as he’d been the lap previous. The race stewards deemed it a racing incident, and neither party was penalized, but that didn’t stop Max from shouting on the radio that Hamilton was “moving under braking,” which Max himself had been penalized for just two races prior.

This kind of behavior is inexcusable for a driver leading the championship by 76 points. Max could fuck off back home for the next three Grands Prix and still have the points lead. The series has run 13 races so far this season and Max has won seven of them. Right now he’s the only driver with more than one victory this season.

Much of this was overshadowed by McLaren’s intra-team battle at the front of the field, which saw Lando Norris cajoled into giving up his second F1 Grand Prix victory to allow teammate Oscar Piastri through to grab his first. While I’m postulating, I’ll say here that it was a mistake to reverse the positions of the McLarens. The team should absolutely have allowed Norris to drive off to the victory, because on a day when Verstappen has issues, you have to capitalize on points.

I still fully believe that Verstappen will win the driver’s title this year, but it’s admittedly much closer than I imagined it might be at the start of the season. If Lando loses the driver’s title this year by any less than seven points (admittedly unlikely), it’ll be his team’s fault.