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F1 Midweek: Max Verstappen More Than Ready For Title Fight; His Father Made Sure Of It

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The Formula 1 season is five races old, and currently, it’s a three-driver battle for the world championship (four if you count George Russell, which I don’t). If Max Verstappen is to win his fifth consecutive championship, he’ll have to do something he’s never done – outdo two other drivers to capture the championship. That’s rare air for a driver whose competition is often limited to one other driver, or no driver at all (Verstappen won the 2022 championship by 146 points, and the 2023 title by a whopping 290 points).

Verstappen’s rivals this season are the McLaren duo of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. Piastri is fresh off a win (his third of the season) in Saudi Arabia, a win made possible when he punked pole-sitter Verstappen in Turn 1 on the first lap. Piastri screamed into the first corner and gave Verstappen the same ultimatum the Dutchman has used many times before: if you blink, I’m taking the lead. If you don’t blink, we both crash. Verstappen blinked; his actions led to a five-second penalty, and Piastri took the lead and never relinquished it. 

It’s a scenario with which Verstappen should be familiar. The teenage Verstappen spent his formative F1 years making extremely bold, and sometimes extremely risky, moves and overtake attempts that often resulted in wrecks (just ask Sebastian Vettel, for one). But Verstappen’s apparent recklessness wasn’t without purpose; he was establishing a precedent, one that he would frequently apply in his future title-winning seasons. That Verstappen precedent was: If you think I have any intention of backing off as we race into this corner, you’re wrong. And to prove it, I’ll drive so deep into this corner that I’ll run right over you if you don’t back off.

Verstappen could afford to have a few wrecks; he was not yet a challenger for the world championship. His goal was not to win championships at the time. Instead, his goal was to lay the groundwork for the future, when he would be able to win championships. And he basically had free reign to do so. Who was going to stop him? Certainly no one at Red Bull. Verstappen had already been anointed their new F1 messiah; Red Bull’s duty was to make sure he believed it. And certainly not Verstappen’s father, Jos, a career F1 backmarker with questionable parenting skills, who ostensibly bullied his child into becoming a prodigy, so the elder Verstappen could vicariously live out his failed F1 dreams through his exponentially more talented offspring.

And therein lies the reason Verstappen is more than mentally equipped to fend off the challengers of the young, up-and-coming McLaren duo — this challenge from Piastri and Norris is nothing compared to what Max overcame under the demanding upbringing and critical eye of his father.    

To say the younger Verstappen was driven by his father to be successful and ruthless would be an understatement. To say that a 15-year-old Max was once driven by his father to a gas station and left there after Max crashed and damaged his kart is a true statement. Because it happened, as Max has recounted, some may call Jos Verstappen the “Bobby Knight of Overbearing F1 Fathers/Coaches.” 

In the eyes of Jos Verstappen, that’s called “tough love.” Jos eventually returned and retrieved his son from the gas station. In the eyes of Jos, that’s called “love.” It was back to “tough love” when they returned home, where the elder Verstappen didn’t speak to his son for an entire week.

That’s just one instance of the type of behavior Jos subjected Max to as his kid climbed the ranks of the karting world, earning the label as F1’s next superstar. But there were many others, some of which observers described as abusive. Jos, of course, has denied these allegations, but even the most pro-Jos Verstappen would be hard-pressed to label the process anything less than “unorthodox.”   

It appears that this form of motivation was effective, as Max has dominated the sport for the past five years. And despite Jos’ hard-line methods, Max matured into an even-tempered adult, not at all one prone to profane radio rants, with an absolute zero sense of entitlement, who is not one to lash out when things are not going his way. In case you’re wondering, that last sentence was 100% pure sarcasm. Unlike the following statement, which is 0% sarcasm: Darth Vader was a better father than Jos Verstappen.

Were Piastri or Norris ever abandoned at a gas station, or any other location, public or private, where a parent should never leave a 15-year-old? Some would say (actually, only Jos Verstappen would say) their lack of a single world championship between them would indicate that they were never abandoned at a gas station and that they should have been. 

That’s the mindset of a father who utilizes a “take no prisoners” approach to training and managing a child to greatness. Although Max, the beneficiary or victim of that approach, may question the “no prisoners” part of that approach. However, it has served him well, and for reasons that may stem from his father, he is one of the most, if not the most, ruthless and cutthroat drivers in F1.    

Of course, who’s to say Max wouldn’t be exactly where he is today without his father’s influence? Max could have very well developed his killer instinct on his own, or even with his father choosing positive reinforcement as his motivational tool. Max could be a four-time world champion and the kindest, most affable, and friendliest driver on the F1 grid, but what fun would that be? That kind, affable, and friendly driver was Max’s former Red Bull teammate, Daniel Ricciardo. And we know how their careers took wildly divergent paths. And I surely believe Max is glad he’s on his own path.   

I’m not suggesting you can’t be a world champion and not be a total jerk. You can be; Lewis Hamilton did it seven times. But that’s not Max Verstappen’s style; a nice-guy Max would not be where he is today. And he has his father to thank for that. In this battle with Piastri and Norris, who obviously weren’t raised by fathers even remotely akin to Jos Verstappen, Max wants to play the villain. It’s the role he was raised and trained to play. It should be an easy role for him to fulfill. After all, he was raised by a villain.