Photo: Toro Rosso
If something you can’t take at face-to-Max Verstappen is courage and faith in himself. The pilot Dutch came to Formula 1 with only 17 years, raising certain suspicions, and carrying on his shoulders an important pressure. Almost completed their first season in the premier class, the general opinion is that Toro Rosso is not wrong in giving a seat to a minor, having regard to his performance. The Dutch struggle with Grosjean and Hulkenberg to finish among the top ten, the position he currently occupies, thanks to its 47 points. Was asked what has been your progress after the 17 first race: “I Think I improved in all areas. Especially after only a season in the lower categories, when you give the jump to the Formula 1, I think the pure speed is there, and it is only a matter of develop in all other areas. I think I was in that pretty well“.
If you have something to highlight from your performance, you are left with the sessions on Saturday: “I Think that I have improved in everything. Especially in classification, I think that everything is going well for now in all areas“. What made the difference in his performance in classification was to go gradually abandoning the fact of being an rookie total: “I got with the experience. To understand the behaviour of the tyres and things like that”. Therefore, the conclusions drawn from its first year are very positive, even exceeding their expectations: “I’m very happy with the way it is going throughout the season. Thanks to the help of the team is going much better than I expected, because I’m still very young and I have a lot of things to learn”.
Verstappen was fourth in Hungary and the united States, staying very close to being the youngest driver on the podium. The record still has Vettel (he also won with the team of Faenza), with 21 years and 2 months, so Max has enough time to achieve this and other records, such as winning a race: “I’m Not in a hurry to enter a team of first level, although if you get two quarters positions are very close to the podium and you want to achieve upload. But I still have many things to learn, and I’m pretty happy where I am now, although I wish in a couple of years to be able to fight for victories. Everyone wants that“.
finally, the son of former rider Jos Verstappen analyzed the strong and weak points Toro Rosso: “The strong point is the atmosphere in the team, maybe it is something Italian. I enjoyed a lot in karting, and here also. It’s like a big family, and I believe that when a driver feels well in a team, also the performance is better, so no doubt you enjoy it. Also the team is still very young and very ambitious, and if you think of the past year, there has been a large step forward in the car, so I’m very happy with that, to be able to drive a race car as good. We don’t have a weak point too big, if anything we lack a bit of top speed, but nothing more”.
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