The Dutch Formula 1 driver begins to tremble at the advance that the competitors have had during the Barcelona GP
Despite his recent dominant performance at the Formula 1 Spanish Grand Prix, Max Verstappen stresses that Red Bull can’t afford to rest on their laurels. The Dutchman topped every practice session at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya and took pole position by almost half a second without needing to complete a final lap in Q3.
Verstappen led every lap of the race and posted the fastest lap, earning him his fifth victory in seven starts in 2023, extending his championship lead to 53 points. The mentality of Verstappen focuses on continuous improvement. “We just have to focus on ourselves, try to keep improving the car,” Verstappen said.
Verstappen’s mentality is always to improve
Despite the resounding success, the pilot of Red Bull insists on the importance of not getting stuck. “In this world you cannot stay still. We kept trying to find things on the car, trying to learn, like understanding why the hard (tyre) didn’t work with the car,” he added. Red Bull’s performance has been undeniably dominant, but the future is still fraught with uncertainty.
Verstappen expresses a open and curious attitude towards upcoming races: “We will see what happens in the next races. I don’t know if there will be tracks that are better or worse. We’ll find out.” One aspect that caught Verstappen’s attention during the Spanish Grand Prix was the behavior of the harder tire compound. The Red Bull driver admitted to his surprise at the number of problems he had with this compound.
The performance of the hard compound in Formula 1
“He behaved like a worse Medium, by having the same type of degradation, and it just slid a lot more,” he explained. The driver had to adapt to these conditions and complete his laps on these tyres, despite the difficulties. “Fortunately, we had another pit stop, but it definitely wasn’t the most enjoyable stint I’ve ever done.
Fortunately, however, the car is still fast, so you don’t really waste time,” Verstappen added. Although he did not expect this reaction with the hard compound, the driver acknowledged that “sometimes you have these surprises. Like I said, it wasn’t as nice and probably a bit more difficult to drive. Verstappen’s approach of constant improvement and adaptation, combined with Red Bull’s amazing speed and performance, will certainly be to the team’s advantage.