Jos Verstappen on Max' Spanish podium finish: 'Max needed this'
Published on 14 May 2018 by Mike Motilall
After a tough start of the season, Max Verstappen finally scored his first podium finish this year. His father, Jos Verstappen, takes a seat at Ziggo Sport’s Peptalk to look back at the Spanish Grand Prix, as well as the season so far and to also preview the races ahead.
“Yes, this was something he really needed”, Jos replies on the question if he was happy after his son finished third yesterday. “It happened at the right moment, for the race in Monaco, it definitely provides some more confidence. At the start, Max didn’t take any unnecessary risks and kept his cool. The lap times were solid at the start of the race, in short it was a strong race. This is what we want to see every weekend.”
Despite the podium, Jos sees enough room for improvement: “Of course, a podium is always great, but ultimately you want more. The car has more performance in the race, only qualifying remains an issue. If we can make it to the front row during qualifying, Max can win every race.”
That qualifying is an issue has a lot to do with the qualifying settings of the engines of Ferrari and Mercedes: “The thing they’re doing with the engine is called ‘detoning’. They are able to do that per engine just a couple of minutes and they always do that in Q3”, Max’ dad explains. “Renault is at a complete loss regarding this, they really have no clue how to tackle this. It is very frustrating during qualifying.”
“In the race it is also very difficult to overtake”, Jos continues. “Barcelona is a tough track overtaking wise and it depends on others as well. It has to do with the new rules. The front wing is too advanced, it creates so many vortexes behind the car that you are not able to drive close behind. And when you are not close enough to someone, you cannot overtake.”
However, Verstappen sr. does see a solution to bring back some excitement: “They need to bring tyres that will run into problems in the race. Tyres that will last maybe eight laps for a particular car and maybe more for another one. This will make the races exciting again.”
Regarding the first four races loaded with incidents concerning Max, Jos only blames Max for running into Sebastian Vettel in China: “Only that one. It was misjudged. If he had turned in half a meter earlier, nothing would have happened. He was distraught about it. You approach the corner with 330 kph. and then miss it by just half a meter. Add to that the frustration that Ricciardo was ahead of him, after that overtake on Hamilton, which I still think was very good. If you discuss this matter for five minutes, it’s enough. But it’s not even necessary, and he knows that.”
After the disillusion in China, a greater disappointment followed in Baku. Both Red Bull Racing-team mates ran into each other on track. Despite that, the good relationship between Verstappen and Ricciardo hasn’t been affected after the incident in Baku, says Jos: “Things are okay. That wasn’t an issue even after Baku. They both didn’t feel comfortable in that situation.” If the Ozzie will remain with the team, Jos is unable to say anything about that: “He still doesn’t have a contract for next year at Red Bull. They would really like to keep him, but I think he is taking his time. At Ferrari, Vettel is slightly better than Raikkonen and at Mercedes, Hamilton is better than Bottas. Between Ricciardo and Max there is just less difference. I also think that the battle between them is better for the team. It only makes them better.”
Finally, Jos looks at the coming race in Monaco with confidence: “We have a chance to win in Monaco. The engine is not so important there, because the straights are not so long. You need to make sure that you don’t slip up there, that the car has been set up well and you need to have confidence. Our car is also really good on tracks with low grip. You could clearly see that in Barcelona in the final sector, our car was the best there. Just like in Monaco there are only slow corners there. So we really have a chance in Monaco.”
