Max Verstappen
Discussion
The silence is deafening?davidd said:
To be fair to Max I thought he had a great race yesterday. Clearly on the back foot for a lot of it he kept his head, stayed clean and got a good result.
Yes he clearly drove well and I think the Red Bull strategy was almost perfect to bring him back into the running as they did. I assume they relied upon the data provided by Perez, but either way, it was a masterclass in Strategy to me.Max's result yesterday was partly down to a great drive on the final stint, but mostly down to great strategy calls by the team.
They blinked first to switch to inters, and Max closed the gap to the leading 4 when he had been miles off the pace. Piastri was the victim of an awful McLaren call here that effectively ended his race.
They put him on a tyre that they knew he could push hard all the way to the end on, and didn't gamble on softs. McLaren made an awful call to allow Norris to switch to softs, and their place advantage to RB was eroded by the degradation.
Yesterday was a tricky race, where both McLarens were victims of bad calls. On pure race pace alone, they and poor old Russell could have reasonably expected to finish ahead of Max.
Kudos to Max for the relentless pace in that final stint, but if McLaren had got their strategy right and Russell's car hadn't broken, we'd have likely seen Max chasing Russell/Lewis down for 4th place in those closing laps.
They blinked first to switch to inters, and Max closed the gap to the leading 4 when he had been miles off the pace. Piastri was the victim of an awful McLaren call here that effectively ended his race.
They put him on a tyre that they knew he could push hard all the way to the end on, and didn't gamble on softs. McLaren made an awful call to allow Norris to switch to softs, and their place advantage to RB was eroded by the degradation.
Yesterday was a tricky race, where both McLarens were victims of bad calls. On pure race pace alone, they and poor old Russell could have reasonably expected to finish ahead of Max.
Kudos to Max for the relentless pace in that final stint, but if McLaren had got their strategy right and Russell's car hadn't broken, we'd have likely seen Max chasing Russell/Lewis down for 4th place in those closing laps.
CanAm said:
Two clean passes between Max and Lando yesterday. I wonder if they had a gentleman’s agreement?
think it more the case that DRS was hugely powerful down to Stowe, and that the entry to that corner is so wide (and a couple of different lines through it are viable) that it's basically impossible to effectively defend. PlywoodPascal said:
think it more the case that DRS was hugely powerful down to Stowe, and that the entry to that corner is so wide (and a couple of different lines through it are viable) that it's basically impossible to effectively defend.
Agreed here too, both had eyes on the long game, especially the first pass - just no point in Verstappen fighting it. The pass on Verstappen back on Norris was similar, Norris would literally have no defence as Max had such a tyre advantage if it wasn't Stowe, it would be one of the next corners.CanAm said:
Two clean passes between Max and Lando yesterday. I wonder if they had a gentleman’s agreement?
I suspect it was a result of the FIA stating that they reviewed Austria and should have issued Max and Black and White flag for his previous actions before the contact....... So I am guessing they will take that action next time we get such "interactions". A shame really because it shows they can race cleanly.
Forester1965 said:
Not sure I believe Verstappen acquiesced because he was influenced by the FIA. I think he knew the car at that point wasn't capable of keeping up and he was nowhere near a lead to defend.
If he's leading in Hungary and threatened he'll be straight back to his old tricks.
I tend to agree.If he's leading in Hungary and threatened he'll be straight back to his old tricks.
Max is ruthless, even reckless sometimes - but not stupid. If he knows the car behind is definitely faster and the end of the race is miles off then there's really no point risking any sort of bold move to prevent the pass, it's inevitable that eventually the car will pass so any risk involved in temporarily preventing it will not ultimately be rewarded.
Very different in Austria when he only had to prevent Lando passing for a few laps so he could claim the win - or so he thunk...
TheDeuce said:
I tend to agree.
Max is ruthless, even reckless sometimes - but not stupid. If he knows the car behind is definitely faster and the end of the race is miles off then there's really no point risking any sort of bold move to prevent the pass, it's inevitable that eventually the car will pass so any risk involved in temporarily preventing it will not ultimately be rewarded.
Very different in Austria when he only had to prevent Lando passing for a few laps so he could claim the win - or so he thunk...
Similar to the 2022 Austrian GP, ironically enough. His car was using up his tyres and he had nothing to fend off CLC and happily let the Monegasque through a couple of times. Some claimed Max had matured...Max is ruthless, even reckless sometimes - but not stupid. If he knows the car behind is definitely faster and the end of the race is miles off then there's really no point risking any sort of bold move to prevent the pass, it's inevitable that eventually the car will pass so any risk involved in temporarily preventing it will not ultimately be rewarded.
Very different in Austria when he only had to prevent Lando passing for a few laps so he could claim the win - or so he thunk...
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