He would have won even from last place! Helmut Marko praises Max Verstappen’s performance. So what did he say about him?

He would have won even after starting from last place. Max Verstappen heard words of praise from Helmut Mark after his clear victory in Belgium, and rightly so. So what did the Red Bull advisor have to say about him and what to expect in the Netherlands?

Verstappen clearly dominated the Belgian Grand Prix on Sunday, despite starting from 14th place. Although he set the fastest time in qualifying, he was penalised for changing over-the-limit power unit components, which just condemned him to start from the back.

The Red Bull driver, however, completely dominated the race at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit and took the lead on lap 12, even with the help of the safety car.

Helmut Marko, special advisor and head of Red Bull’s driver development programme, admitted after the race that Verstappen would have won even after starting from last place, and therefore from 20th position.

“I think so (he would have done it – ed.), we knew before the summer break that we would change the engine here. We thought: well, let’s try to get some points. But after qualifying we thought about a podium, but Jos (Verstappen’s father – ed.) said no, he’s going to win,” Marko revealed in an interview with Racing News 365.

“At Spa you need to have a strong engine, we have an engine that has the same power as the others from 2021,” he added.

A dominant season in terms of results

Verstappen currently leads the drivers’ championship with 284 points ahead of teammate Sergio Pérez, who has picked up 191 points so far. Charles Leclerc, driving a Ferrari, is currently in third position.

However, the 24-year-old Monegasque is 98 points behind the leader Verstappen, and the title fight is out of the question. Red Bull boss Christian Horner then compared his driver’s performance to the days when Red Bull dominated Formula 1. To the times of Sebastian Vettel, who won four titles in a row between 2010 and 2013.

“We haven’t seen such dominance since then. This time we have strong opposition. With Vettel we raced mainly against Ferrari, one year against McLaren, but here we are racing against Ferrari and Mercedes, so we are happy and really proud,” explains Marko.

The next race for Verstappen and co. is the Dutch Grand Prix at the Zandvoort circuit on Sunday 4 September.

“You have to qualify very well in Zandvoort because overtaking is very difficult and you don’t know what the weather forecast will be like, whether it will be too windy or whether the circuit will get sand. But we are in good shape. The good thing also is that we don’t have to win. If we see that we won’t win the race, we will just go for the points,” he concluded.

F1, Racing News 365