Max Verstappen, with his RB19, is unstoppable this season and it looks like he will go on to dominate the whole of 2023. This kind of dominance hasn’t been seen in the sport since Sebastian Vettel’s Red Bull days. Mad Max, along with his teammate Sergio Perez, has recently broken the record set by McLaren of most consecutive wins for a constructor with their 12th consecutive triumph.
The Dutchman won his eighth straight Formula One race at Spa and increased his lead over the field of drivers by a massive 125 points, but one of this weekend’s most talked-about topics was the nature of the conversations on the radio between Max and his crew.
Max Verstappen wins Belgian F1 Grand Prix despite five-place grid penalty
After winning both the 2021 and 2022 titles, Mad Max is all set to welcome his third World Drivers Championship title. The Dutchman secured first place in Friday’s qualifying and then went on to even win the sprint on the following day.
Max started from P6 on Sunday’s race as he was given a 5-place grid penalty. The penalty given by the FIA was due to exceeding the number of gearbox changes this season.
Despite the major setback, the 25-year-old overcame the penalty with ease and won, making it his eighth win in a row under the seemingly unbeatable Red Bull Racing team. The two-time world champion finished 22.305 seconds ahead of teammate Sergio Perez.
With this victory, Verstappen extended his lead over Perez in the title race to 125 points.
Red Bull got their 13th straight win this weekend, making it a record-extending win for them. And Spa proved to be the team’s fifth 1-2 finish of the 2023 season.
Max Verstappen has this to say about it in an interview:
“was really enjoyable.”
“It’s a new spot, that’s for sure — P6,” he said, (referring to his starting position) “I knew that we had a great car. It was just about surviving Turn 1.
“We made all the right moves.”
A perfect weekend in Spa 🇧🇪 We’ve been on it from start to finish @redbullracing 💪 The car was great 🚀
Thank you Orange Army, your support has been unreal 🙌 #BelgianGP pic.twitter.com/05mFAL5FWG
— Max Verstappen (@Max33Verstappen) July 30, 2023
Max Verstappen Engage in hilarious radio conversation with his race engineer
In the latter part of the race, the Dutchman was warned about pushing and putting too much pressure on his soft compound tires. Verstappen added the idea of making another pit stop on the team radio, though, to give the Red Bull pit team a little more practice before the summer break.
The radio conversation between Max and Redbull race engineer Lambiase went like this:
Lambiase said “This tire had reasonable degradation in the first stint. I’d ask you to use your head a bit more.” to which the Red Bull prodigy replied: “I could also push on and we do another stop? A little bit of pit stop training.” But this joke was given a cold reaction by his engineer, who said “No. Not this time.”
Max Verstappen's season summed up in a radio message 😅 pic.twitter.com/GObqlQX44L
— ESPN F1 (@ESPNF1) July 30, 2023
Verstappen crossed the line with the fastest lap of the Belgian Grand Prix, but that was short-lived as Lewis Hamilton snatched it away from him in P4. Lewis had to pit for better tires to get the fastest lap of the race, and he did.
What do you think about Red Bull dominating the sport currently? Let us know your thoughts about the savage reply from Max Verstappen on his team radio in the comments section down below.
