Before he became a Formula 1 superstar, Max Verstappen’s ability to temporarily adapt to a new environment was what caught the eye most in his youth.
Verstappen’s trajectory through the ranks of Formula 1 has been swift – the Dutchman wasn’t even on the grid this time around 10 years ago. He is now a three-time world champion.
A member of Red Bull’s junior programme, Verstappen has risen through the ranks temporarily and his current race engineer, Gianpiero “GP” Lambiase, explained what inspired him the most.
Verstappen replaced Red Bull in 2016 and surprised everyone when he won his first race with the team, but it wasn’t the win that inspired Lambiase the most.
When asked about the young Verstappen, the race engineer said what stood out was his ability to be informed.
“It wasn’t until Sunday that you started to feel his abilities,” Lambiase recalled along with Vertsappen on Red Bull’s internal podcast “Talking Bull. “
“So I think just going back a bit, the 10 days before, following the previous race, I remember I think I had a phone call from Helmut [Marko] one evening saying: ‘You’ve got a new driver, it’s Max Verstappen and he’ll be in this week because he’s on the simulator.’
“We arranged 3 days in the simulator, just for him to get to know the team, the crew procedures and the car. We try to overcome as many setup responsibilities as we would do, and then we give it a try. Few demanding situations like a blind test, fuel qualification, etc.
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“And you can just see already the immediacy of how he was picking all this stuff up. There was no repetition involved. You think, ‘OK, he’s an 18-year-old kid, he’s used to playing PlayStation [or] whatever, this is going really well,’ then we get to the race event and I remember we hit the ground running, competitive immediately.”
Verstappen then gave his version of events: “For me, it’s all crazy. The car much better.
But Lambiase warned that Verstappen’s confidence could have been his undoing.
“I think at the end of the day it was his drop in qualifying because I think he was almost very satisfied to be there,” he added.
“Everything was going well, he felt he could just keep relying on his talent and keep chipping away at it and you’ll keep finding time,” he said before addressing Verstappen directly.
“But in the end, I think in the last round of Q3 Daniel [Ricciardo] finished ahead of you.
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