“I see the future as rather bleak”
Father talks about frustrated Max Verstappen’s Formula 1 future
March 28, 2026 – 12:35 p.mReading time: 2 minutes
Max Verstappen has another bitter day in qualifying at Suzuka. His father expresses a fear.
Max Verstappen was served again. The Dutchman complained that his Red Bull was “undriveable” in qualifying for the Japanese Grand Prix (Sunday, 7 a.m. CET in the live ticker on t-online). In Suzuka, where he had already attracted negative attention on Thursday when journalists were thrown out during his media round next to the track, his catastrophic year continued from a sporting perspective with eleventh place on the grid.
And so the four-time world champion took merciless revenge on his car. “It’s really difficult and unpredictable,” said Verstappen, who had big problems, especially in the corners. “We thought we fixed that a little bit in the third practice.” But during the hunt for times it “came to a point again” where the car “became undriveable”.
Verstappen is simply not enjoying the new Formula 1. On the traditional circuit, where he won the last four races, the former series winner even starts behind his teammate Isack Hadjar, who came eighth in qualifying. And so now even dad is worried.
“Driving these cars is not a challenge for him. To be honest, I’m afraid that Max might lose his motivation,” Jos Verstappen had told the Dutch Telegraaf before qualifying: “He used to think driving a Formula 1 car was the best thing there was. But now I see the future rather bleak. I wish I could say that it’s not like that, but looking at his future, I actually see it as a problem.”
Son Max doesn’t like the new hybrid engines with their high electric content at all; in his opinion they are a “joke”. “As a driver, you should be rewarded for your courage and skill,” said Jos Verstappen: “But if you take a corner as quickly as possible, you’ll end up being slower over the course of a lap. That takes away the racing feeling from the whole thing.”
