Red Bull chief Christian Horner has confirmed Lewis Hamilton’s suspicion that Max Verstappen “hasn’t broken a sweat” all season by suggesting that the Dutchman could have ‘pushed harder’ this year.
Christian Horner has opened up on Max Verstappen’s victories.
Verstappen was absolutely prevailing in 2023, winning 19 out of 22 Thousand Prixs. The Red Bull star turned into the primary driver to break the sought after 500-point obstruction and came out on top for the Drivers’ title by an overwhelming margin 290 focuses.
Seven-time world champion Hamilton, knows all too well how it feels to be on top of the grid, and spoke from a place of nostalgia as he poured praise onto Verstappen and Red Bull in his post-season review.
“You watch the Red Bull, and it does everything well. It looks very similar to my 2020 car, characteristic-wise. Super-stable. They are firing on all cylinders. It looks like it’s in that kind of window like we used to have, which for a driver is a dream because then you can really extract your own personal abilities to the max,” Hamilton told The Race.
“I don’t think we have ever really truly pushed them… maybe Austin we were the closest but even then I think they still always had a tenth or two on us at the bare minimum.”
“You go through lap times and some of the data from Max [Verstappen], and you can see he is chilling at the front more often than not,” he added. “I don’t think he has broken a sweat during the year.”
During a recent interview with Sky Sports Horner was asked how frequently Verstappen was cruising during the races he won? To which, he answered: “There’s consistently a component of overseeing on the grounds that the tires are delicate, so not overemphasizing the vehicle.
“In any case, that concertinas at various places in the year and we essentially quit fostering the vehicle mid-year on the grounds that, with the air stream limitations that we’ve had, we needed to single out where to convey our assets. So you found in the final part of the year the field ebbing nearer and nearer.
Unquestionably, toward the start of the year, I believe that first race in Bahrain, we might have been an additional 20 seconds up the street assuming he’d had been pushing.
“Unquestionably, toward the start of the year, I believe that first race in Bahrain, we might have been an additional 20 seconds up the street assuming he’d had been pushing.”