Formula 1: Max Verstappen talks ‘little details’ needed to improve
By Asher Fair
Max Verstappen knows it will be tough to improve upon a record-breaking Formula 1 world championship-winning season in 2022, but he knows there are areas in which he can do so.
Red Bull launched their 2023 Formula 1 season last Friday in New York City, revealing the RB19 ahead of what they hope will be a successful title defense.
The Milton Keynes-based team ended Mercedes’ eight-year run atop the constructor standings in 2022, winning their first title since 2013. The team won four straight titles — on the driver side and the constructor side — from 2010 to 2013.
While Red Bull didn’t win the 2021 constructor title, Max Verstappen won his first world championship in epic fashion, passing seven-time and four-time reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton on the final lap of the season’s final race.
Max Verstappen then won the 2022 title in dominant fashion, securing a Formula 1 record 15 wins.
The 25-year-old Dutchman enters the 2023 season trying to become the first three-time world champion since Hamilton won his third title in 2015 and Red Bull’s first three-time world champion since Sebastian Vettel won the third of his four straight titles in 2012.
Following the launch, Verstappen spoke to Beyond the Flag about how he can still search for new ways to improve after having a season that was just about as good as it gets.
“I know that sometimes it can be hard to replicate the season, but I think it’s the same as with the car, right? You always try to improve it, and I always look at the little details,” Verstappen, who now sits sixth on the all-time wins list with 35 victories, stated.
One of his mottos is “always keep pushing to improve”, though that can be a tall task after one of the greatest seasons the sport has ever seen.
“Even when you have had a good race, there are always things that you could’ve done better,” he continued. “And then of course you also learn from the bad races. By always trying to look for these little improvements and general experience you gain year after year, you try to do better. But of course it also depends a lot on the package you have around you.”
Verstappen had very few bad races in 2022. Excluding his two DNFs, he won 75% of his races. But how the new Red Bull package will perform remains unknown, especially as the team deal with a 12-month aerodynamic testing allowance reduction of 10% following their small budget cap breach in 2021.
That being said, Verstappen has proven beyond any shadow of a doubt to be among the elite, and with legendary chief technical officer Adrian Newey still in Red Bull’s corner after putting together his most successful creation of all-time, the RB18, a year ago, when some felt the team could fall behind as a result of the time and energy invested into 2021’s RB16B, expectations are high.
The 2023 Formula 1 season is scheduled to get underway at Bahrain International Circuit with the Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday, March 5.