Max Verstappen says he is sick of being asked about his risk of incurring a race ban.
The Red Bull driver is heading into his first race since reaching 11 penalty points on his superlicence, leaving him one away from the threshold of 12 which triggers an automatic race ban.He received three penalty points at the last round of the championship in Spain. Verstappen was penalised for colliding with George Russell.
The Mercedes driver beat him to pole position for tomorrow’s race, meaning the pair will share the front row of the grid on Sunday. Russell was quick to call attention to Verstappen’s precarious situation, noting he has “a few more points on my licence to play with” than his rival if the pair find themselves battling for position again.
However Verstappen was unwilling to discuss whether the situation puts him at a disadvantage compared to Russell. “I don’t need to hear it again,” he said in the FIA press conference after qualifying on Saturday. “It’s really pissing me off.
“I mean, you’re speaking about it on Thursday. It’s such a waste of time, it’s very childish.
“So that’s why I also don’t want to say too much because it’s really annoying, this world that we live in.”
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Verstappen, who did not appear in the FIA press conferences on Thursday, was addressing the FIA press conference moderator. He refused to answer a further question relating to penalty points.
“The car [is] the same as [in] Barcelona, but I do think the team did a great job. When we arrived, the car was immediately in the right window. So setup-wise, I think the team did a very good job.
“Then, of course, it’s fine-tuning little bits and choosing the right tyres for qualifying. But overall, I’ve been fairly happy with the car, which has definitely been a bit more hit-and-miss for us this season.
“I think we just also need to focus on the overall performance that we maybe are lacking sometimes. But also sometimes we are chasing the balance of the car. So it’s two different things. But this weekend, I felt good, and that’s why I’m also very happy, honestly, to be here today in qualifying.”
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Jazz (@jazz)
14th June 2025, 23:09
Author of his own misfortune. And he’ll never change.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
14th June 2025, 23:15
Nor the journalists. Asking the same stuff over and over for a week. What do they want? for Max to say “yeah, I care so little that I’m going to ram George at the first chance I’ve got so I get that ban”.
Khürt Williams (@khurtwilliams)
15th June 2025, 0:29
Yes.
Jazz (@jazz)
15th June 2025, 0:39
Yeah, I get that. I think it’s asking too much of the press to collaborate beforehand to avoid asking driver’s the same repeated question. Still, they wouldn’t be asking him the same repeated question if he’d kept a clean sheet like many of his competitors have managed to achieve.
MoogleSlam
18th June 2025, 18:04
The response from Max is the only childish thing I’ve heard.
kuvemar
14th June 2025, 23:23
Wow. Sure, that’s the problem the world has. How much better would the world be if no one talked about the driver who collects penalty points like Pokemon cards and is on the brink of getting to know what consequences are.
Feuerdrache (@xenomorph91)
14th June 2025, 23:26
Send it into T1, Max. The world wants to see the stewards squirming deciding what penalty to give you.
Derek Edwards
15th June 2025, 0:08
George Russell seems to have a knack of getting into Max’s head and I thought that his post-qualifying remark was a superb way of reminding Max what he has to risk into the first corner tomorrow afternoon. I suspect that having journalists pick up on it and ask Max over and over again all about the points (and thereby putting him even more on edge) was an unexpected bonus. Well played.
Edvaldo
15th June 2025, 0:55
It’s annoying because it dictates how he must drive to avoid a ban. Well, it’s 100% on him. What’s there to say?
nunof
15th June 2025, 1:01
Accusing someone of being childish while acting like it…
Tommy C (@tommy-c)
15th June 2025, 1:21
I don’t know, I think his childish tantrums behind the wheel are magnitudes more annoying…
HW Small
15th June 2025, 6:03
And the more upset Max gets, the more likely he will get that ban :)
BenjaminS (@benihana)
15th June 2025, 8:03
Wow, wow! Fans actually clamoring for an F1 champion to get banned. I don’t believe my eyes at all. Almost as sad as the 1st season of survivor.
SteveP
15th June 2025, 8:26
Did I miss a rule change?
Is use of less-than-polite language now permitted in the FIA press conferences?
Mayrton
15th June 2025, 9:51
This is not very strong from Max. A better way to react to the question would be something like: ‘Ha, you’d like some more headlines on this wouldn’t you? Unfortunately I just have a short answer for you, which is ‘no, I do not approach the first corner any differently’. Full stop. And then just repeat this exact same answer whenever you’re asked.
Now, we see it does get to him and he can be tempted into such answers angry answers.. whilst that might be entertaining to those who like to trigger him, it will only trigger an even better driver in him.
Truth of the exact situation at race start is however that he will have to pay attention since George is not as skilled as he believes himself to be. He has little to none experience in racing someone in an F1 car. And if we look at moments in which he did, we see a clear history of him getting it wrong. So there is a vast chance George will * up for both and even more that Max will get the blame no matter what the situation is, as we’ve seen in the past Race control has a political agenda.
SteveP
15th June 2025, 12:40
The evidence to date (highlights: Mexico 2024, Spain 2025) suggest that an irritated Max is an irrational Max, and that the points results of an irrational Max are substantially lower than those of a rational Max.
How exactly is that a “better driver” scenario?
Tony Mansell (@tonymansell)
15th June 2025, 12:54
Hes lucky hes still in an F1 car. I dont think hes getting enough grief over weaponising his car and potentially injuring a fellow driver DELIBERATLEY. If his lapdog fans opened their eyes and put their tongues away they’d understand. Max is possibly the best driver in F1 EVER, he’s less contentiously the worst human being to have competed in F1
SteveP
15th June 2025, 15:34
He is, largely, what his father made him into.
Good, or ill.
Tony Mansell (@tonymansell)
15th June 2025, 17:05
He makes his own decisions, blaming the sins of the father is BS, to be fair to him he doesnt, he just blames everyone else. His mea culpa after hitting Russell was for sure the absolute minimum requirement, he shouldve apologised to George, preferably whilst kneeling holding a rose between his teeth and crying
David Styles (@ddstyles)
15th June 2025, 15:03
Fingers crossed