Max Verstappen won the 2023 World Championship, but the Red Bull driver was desperate for a sprint win – safety car and poor start prevented that
Max Verstappen achieved his big goal in the Formula 1 sprint in Qatar, but not his small goal. First of all, the most important thing: The Red Bull driver became Formula 1 World Champion for the third time with the result from the sprint. He actually wanted to celebrate this with a victory, but he had to be content with second place behind Oscar Piastri.
Because he couldn’t do anything against the McLaren driver in the final phase – too much went against his strategy in the race. Verstappen had opted for the medium tyre at the start, but it clearly lost out to the soft in the first laps.
“Lando [Norris] and I got eaten up a bit at the start and lost a few positions there because drivers were passing on Soft,” the Dutchman described. “That made it a bit more difficult, of course.”
But Red Bull knew that the Soft tyres would not stand a chance over the distance. That’s what his race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase kept telling him: “I told you, let it come to you,” he informed him over the radio.
Verstappen himself says that the soft tyres were not an option for him: “No, not at all,” he waves off. “I was very surprised when I saw it. Of course they flew in the first laps, but I said okay, see you in a few laps. “
Bad start and safety car trouble
The fact that he had only come out of the first lap in fifth place didn’t faze him. Rather, he was bothered by the fact that the safety car came out three times and disrupted his race to catch up. On the one hand, every neutralised lap helped the drivers on soft tyres, and on the other hand, it prevented Red Bull from exploiting its advantages in terms of tyre wear.
“The safety car and the relatively poor start made a bit of an absurdity of our strategy,” Red Bull’s motorsport consultant Helmut Marko told Sky. “Yes, that didn’t play into our cards,” says Verstappen himself.
He was also on the verge of overtaking George Russell at one point when the safety car came out again and he had to stay behind the Mercedes for the time being. “I lost a lot of time because he had no front tyres left in the fast corners,” he says.
Verstappen was desperate for the win
The Dutchman was desperate to get past Piastri to snatch victory. In addition, he was also slowed down by his race engineer: “We need to watch our left front tyre because we are starting to see some damage on the surface,” he radioed into his ear.
Verstappen’s reply, “I know, I’m trying to do that, but Piastri is pulling away.” But Lambiase retorted, “Forget Piastri, we have to finish.”
Because that was the main task in Saturday’s sprint: to bag the necessary points to make the title perfect. Verstappen also sees it that way in retrospect. “It was a shame, but it was just about making sure we got it done today. That would be nice for tomorrow,” he said.
No chance against McLaren
At the latest after Sergio Perez’s retirement, his World Championship title was mathematically certain. He was of course aware of that in the car: “Yes, I saw that of course, but I was focused on winning the race,” he says.
“He wanted to win,” confirms Marko, “but he saw that because of the safety car our strategy was affected and he also saw that in front Piastri was pulling away.” The Austrian admits: “Well, we wouldn’t have had a chance against Piastri in this constellation. “
Verstappen also says that the pace against McLaren was okay in the end, “but I just needed a few more laps to see what the tyre wear was doing.”
In the end, Max Verstappen lost the sprint against McLaren, but instead he won the most important thing: world championship title number three.
