Current Max Verstappen

2015 sees the arrival of the youngest driver ever to sit in an F1 car. Max Verstappen was born on 30th September 1997 and, assuming he makes the grid in Australia, will only be 17 years and 167 days, beating Jaime Alguersuaris' record by 1 year and 323 days (assuming my maths is correct).

How can such a young man be ready for F1? As the son of former F1 driver Jos Verstappen Max started racing karts at 4½ years old. In 2006 he won the Belgian Minimax Championship in the KF5 category and in 2007 he won both the Dutch and Belgian titles as well as the Belgian Cadet Championship.

In 2009 he won the KF5 Flemish Championship and moved up to International Karting. In 2010 Max finished 2nd in the KF3 World Cup, won the Euro Series and the WSK World Series. In 2011 he again won the WSK World Series and moved up the KF2 class winning the WSK Master Series and the South Garda Winter Cup in 2012. In 2013, at 15 years of age, Verstappen won the World KZ Championship, which is highest level of karting.

For 2014 Max moved up to European Formula 3. He finished 3rd in the Championship winning 10 of the 33 races, more than those who finished above him in the title race. Max was recruited into the Red Bull Young Driver Programme in August 2014 and only 6 days later was announced as one of the drivers for Toro Rosso in F1 for 2015. Apparently he was also being courted by Mercedes for their young driver programme so you have to wonder how much the pull of an F1 seat at Toro Rosso drove the decision to go with Red Bull.

Having already taken part in 3 Friday sessions as a test driver Max Verstappen is the youngest person ever to take part in a Grand Prix weekend. If he acquits himself well during 2015 many will say it is an inspired decision. If he turns into a mobile chicane or treats F1 like a destruction derby I'm sure many questions will be asked as to why someone not even old enough to qualify for a driving licence in his home country is allowed to get behind the wheel of a car at the pinnacle of motorsport.

Future Champion? One season (or even one race) wonder? 2015 will be very interesting for Max Verstappen.
 
What needs to happen is Max needs to be ban from races for that sought of driving . Then Red Bull will need to promote someone to fill his shoes .

Now what if that was Kyvat who would then go on and win the race . That would shut Max up a little
 
If it was anyone else who didn't quite give enough room, got a penalty and moaned on the radio then hardly anyone would bat an eyelid. Because it's Max a lot of people say 'Ban him! Brat! Petulance!' As if others wouldn't moan in his position.
 
vintly - it's not the moaning; it's not even that he got a penalty in Monza; it's that he constantly moves around in the braking zone when he is being overtaken. One of these days, he will have an aeroplane style accident!
 
The calls of petulance and brattishness are I think because of moaning. No one called Schumi a brat when he was decidedly dangerous on many occasions on the racetrack, they called him something much worse. At least I did.

In this instance Max moved back toward to the racing line after his block, which is permitted. He just moved too far by a matter of inches, collected Bottas and paid the price.

Calls to ban him are laughable, driven by a desire to fit his behaviour into the type of person some people have decided he is.
 
For me Max acted like a spoilt kid yesterday. I do understand him wanting to keep Bottas behind him after getting the penalty he didn't feel he deserved. I might have even done the same thing myself just because, what was wrong was when the team told him that fighting Bottas was allowing Vettel to get within the five second penalty window. He said he didn't care.

Well he should damn well care, that means he's losing both himself and the team championship points which could be valuable later in the year. He's also handed Vettel 2 extra points which could have alter the drivers world championship potentially, and all because he was in a snit. I know he's still young but he's been in F1 a while now, it's time to grow up and stop acting like a stroppy teen when he gets told off for being a naughty boy on the track.

Better still, he needs to stop making those potentially dangerous moves as well, but that is perhaps less likely to happen anytime soon based on yesterdays performance.
 
The calls of petulance and brattishness are I think because of moaning. No one called Schumi a brat when he was decidedly dangerous on many occasions on the racetrack, they called him something much worse. At least I did.

In this instance Max moved back toward to the racing line after his block, which is permitted. He just moved too far by a matter of inches, collected Bottas and paid the price.

Calls to ban him are laughable, driven by a desire to fit his behaviour into the type of person some people have decided he is.
Amen.
 
He is winning the penalty points championship. he should be happy he is winning something.

F1 Penalty Points - The F1 Stat Blog

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Interestingly during discussion on the Ocon incident Max was quoted as saying (I paraphrase) "he got the penalty so it's pretty conclusive who was at fault".

Ermmmmm......I don't to be pushed in the stomach or anything but I seem to remember a few occasions when you might not have embraced that view.
 
Like I said he’s young. Idiotic even . Certainly arrogant. But talented. I do hope he learns to use his talent, and a bit of humility would be good..

:D
 
I'm not sure what is more worrying...

That Max still can't see the wrong he's done (he's the only one who has been wronged); or that the FIA and his team discuss what is an appropriate type of service: that's just posh PR.
 
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