JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia — After comfortably winning the Saudi Arabia Grand Prix on Saturday, Max Verstappen and Red Bull are cruising toward another championship season. Both, however, are refusing to be the first to blink in the deepening mystery about the three-time Formula One world champion’s future beyond 2024.
The sort of victory witnessed at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit on Saturday night is what we’ve come to expect from this dominant Red Bull outfit. Verstappen led from pole, only briefly dropping to second after an early Safety Car, and was so far out in front that he was turning down his engine setting late on.
It was utterly routine, and he’ll assuredly enjoy many more like it in 2024.
Which raises an intriguing question for any watching fan: Why would anyone ever leave a team this good? And yet, that’s been the growing question all week in Saudi, because Verstappen’s mind on the subject is not truly known.
– Watch Formula One on ESPN networks all season long
On Feb. 28, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner was cleared of misconduct in a Red Bull GmbH investigation, but controversy around the case — and speculation about its fallout — has continued to swirl.
Last Sunday, Verstappen’s father, Jos, said the team is “in danger of being torn apart” if Horner remains team principal. On Wednesday, Max Verstappen steered clear of discussing his father’s pointed criticism but said he does not envision a day he races in F1 without his dad by his side. On Friday night after qualifying, Verstappen said his Red Bull future was tied to that of advisor Helmut Marko, who’d remarked that he was potentially facing a suspension from the Milton Keynes outfit.
Hours after the Dutch driver sealed his second win from two races, Horner called the bluff of his star’s veiled hints at leaving the team 24 hours earlier, opening the door for the Dutchman to walk away from what could be the greatest team ever assembled.
“You can never say never,” Horner said on Saturday evening on the prospect of Verstappen leaving. “If a driver doesn’t want to be somewhere, then they’ll go somewhere else. But as a team, I can’t see any reason why anybody would want to step out of this team. I think he’s got a great support around him and he’s doing a wonderful job with a great car.”
The car is truly great, too. Verstappen took the chequered flag 13.643 seconds ahead of teammate Sergio Pérez. Charles Leclerc crossed the finish line in his Ferrari 18.639 seconds behind.
As such, Red Bull is expected to waltz to the title this year, and with teams set to be distracted next year by the 2026 regulation changes, its advantage may well be locked in until the end of this current cycle. It would not be a wild statement to suggest that Verstappen will be a five-time world champion when F1’s new rules come into play, assuming he stays with Red Bull.
That’s why the notion of Verstappen walking away from an all-conquering dynasty would have seemed like pure fantasy only a few weeks ago, but the idea has gained traction since the start of the season. The idea dominated media day on Wednesday and was still being talked about after the race finished on Saturday.
“Let’s word it like this,” Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said following the grand prix. “I think this is a decision that Max needs to take, and there is no team — up and down the grid — that wouldn’t do handstands to have him in the car.”
Wolff, long-time nemesis of Horner, would relish the opportunity to snatch away his rival’s generational talent. Wolff’s driver George Russell said earlier in the week Verstappen should “100%” be top of Mercedes’ list if he is available to replace Ferrari-bound Lewis Hamilton.
Regardless of the risk of losing his prodigious driver to a rival, and Vertappen having seemingly no shortage of suitors, Horner has refused to back down.
“You can’t force somebody to be somewhere just because of a piece of paper,” Horner said. “If somebody didn’t want to be at this team, then … we’re not going to force somebody against their will to be here.”
From conversations in the paddock, both with sources within Red Bull and at other teams, there is a growing feeling that if the Verstappens have been playing a game of chicken, they are the ones most likely to back down.
Red Bull appears to have the stronger hand, given the car it will have in 2025. Drivers like two-time world champion Fernando Alonso are monitoring every development.
Verstappen’s options, meanwhile, are more underwhelming.
“I’d love to have him, but first we need to sort out our car,” Wolff said. It’s a painful reality for Verstappen if he were ever serious about leaving, given Russell finished 39.936 seconds behind the Dutchman in Jeddah and 46.788 seconds in arrears at the season opener in Bahrain.
Whatever the next development in this saga is, there are no doubts about where Horner’s mind is at: “We are a team, and no single individual is bigger than the team,” he said.
The Red Bull brinkmanship shows no signs of slowing down, with the F1 paddock next set to reassemble ahead of the Australian Grand Prix on March 24. Remarkably, while this storm rages within the garage, Verstappen and Red Bull look as strong on track as ever before.
Source: www.espn.com