Max Verstappen: “Many people talk about my future except me”

The Dutch came to the crossing on the possibility of leaving Red Bull at the end of the year if the team fails to give him a winning car, an issue that fired Helmut Marko, a strong man of the team.

The Baréin Grand Prix began an internal storm in Red Bull that was cooking over low heat. That 2023 dominant team, which achieved 21 triumphs in 22 races, is only a memory that seems distant doors inside the shield of energy drinks. The 2024 start was continuity, with eight successes in the first ten appointments. But little by little, the performance of the car was lost. From that unbeatable RB19, he went to the RB20 that reached the closing of last season with his tongue outside and with the conquest of Max Verstappen of his fourth title thanks to three determining factors: his enormous talent, the advantage he had taken in the first dozen competitions and the errors of Lando Norris and McLaren when they had become a threat. The performance drop became stronger with the RB21 of 2025. The success of the champion in Japan overlap the debacle (thanks to the cold and benevolent asphalt for the tires), But Baréin was the slapping. Max fought against Pierre Gasly and his Alpine to end an opaque sixth place. “I am not fighting for the championship, I’m just competing,” said Verstappen. And immediately, a possible departure from the Dutch of the Austrian Team at the end of the year emerged, executing a clause that would allow the termination without reaching the expiration signed by 2028.

Helmut Marko, an advisor and strong man of Red Bull, confirmed that the boreal summer break is the deadline in which its star can execute that exit clause if it is not among the top three of the championship. The engineers of the drinks team and the Popes put together a crisis committee in the same Sakhir Autodrome on Sunday after the race. You have to find solutions to be competitive again and, especially, to avoid the escape of Verstappen. In the three days that separated the closure of Baréin’s career and the press conference of Saudi Arabia, fifth date, two strong and already mentioned options were woven for the monarch’s future: Mercedes and Aston Martin. And Ralf Schumacher put Alpine in the game.

In the middle of the previous conference, Max was consulted on everything that was discussed in the week about his possible departure from Red Bull. “To be honest, I still work to improve the car and obviously Baréin was not a good weekend for us and we are all disappointed by that. So, we are trying to improve the car, arrive with new ideas to improve the car, things of the competition and in that my weeks go, improve the situation ”, pointed out. Given the requisition of a journalist to clarify whether the team’s exit was an option, it was blunt: “You focus on commenting on the careers, I do not think about other scenarios.”

In the middle of the teams that sound, an Italian journalist asked him why not Ferrari. The champion, after a laugh, said: “Honestly, there are many people talking about my future, except me. As I said before, I am focused on my car, working with the whole team. It’s all what I am thinking about F1. I am relaxed.”

Red Bull engineers hope to have solved in Jeddah the inconvenience of brakes that emerged in RB21 in BARÉIN. More complicated will be to improve the rear train grip in the middle part of the curves, the Achilles heel in which they work with the track data because those collected in the wind tunnel were not similar when the car reached the asphalt.