Max Verstappen says he won’t ever be snug on this 12 months’s championship battle due to how aggressive the season has been to this point.
Purple Bull began 2024 in wonderful type, with Verstappen successful 5 of the primary seven races, and ending second from pole place in Miami. Whereas there have been two additional wins since then, the final 4 races have yielded only a solitary podium, and Verstappen is cautious of the challenges from a number of fronts, even when he’s much less involved concerning the lead to Belgium after taking an influence unit penalty.
“It’s by no means snug,” Verstappen mentioned. “There’s at all times issues that may go unsuitable or can occur to you. So each weekend it’s worthwhile to be in high type.
“I believe it shifts just a little bit. For positive, continually McLaren has been actually fast. Mercedes has been fast, however not in every single place. And from our facet, now we have a bit of labor to do, we all know that. We’ve a couple of issues to investigate as nicely, what to do with the automobile for the rest of the season.
“However alternatively, after all, having an engine penalty [at Spa-Francorchamps], I believe if the entire vehicles had that, their race would additionally look very completely different. So it’s not very reasonable to totally have a look at my race coming from P11, as a result of in the event you simply begin with them, the race could be very completely different.
“I believe there’s issues that possibly we will do completely different, or analyze the issues that we’ve delivered to the automobile. And we’ll analyze all of that now over the break.”
Prime of the listing for evaluation from Verstappen’s standpoint is the best way the RB20 makes use of its tires after having continuously seen McLaren show stronger tempo in the direction of the top of stints.
“I believe our essential concern is the automobile,” he mentioned. “That’s what we must always concentrate on primarily, as a result of I believe in the event you have a look at Checo’s weekend [in Belgium], it was very constructive, I’d say. After all, within the race, it simply exhibits that now we have difficulties with the tires – the tire life – so I believe that must be our essential precedence.”
Mercedes’ run of three wins in 4 races has seen one other menace to Purple Bull emerge, however concurrently prevented Lando Norris from considerably closing the 78-point hole to Verstappen within the drivers’ standings – one thing the Dutchman is seeing as a constructive.
“Unbelievable … I imply, I choose to have it like that than one workforce out of the blue dominating each single race,” he mentioned.
