The Dutchman has already expressed several times in the still young season that Max Verstappen is not really happy with the new regulations in Formula 1. On Sunday, too, the Red Bull driver gave vent to his displeasure with the “new” motorsport premier class. A farewell at the end of the season seems absolutely possible.
Max Verstappen said he was “not enjoying the whole thing anymore” after the Japanese Grand Prix on “BBC Radio 5 Live”. When asked whether the four-time world champion might turn his back on Formula 1 at the end of the year, the 28-year-old answered openly: “That’s exactly what I mean. I think about everything here in the paddock.”
Away from the racetrack, he was “very happy,” he emphasized, citing his happy private life as one of the main reasons why he was considering leaving the premier motorsport class: “Is it worth it? Or do I enjoy being at home with my family more, seeing my friends more often, when you don’t enjoy the sport?”
Formula 1: Verstappen “wants to be here, but…”
The superstar described the fact that his team’s lack of sporting success – Verstappen only finished in eighth place on Sunday – had to do with his mind games as a “joke”. The Red Bull driver made it clear that he could “easily accept being in seventh or eighth place where I am at the moment: “But when you are in seventh or eighth place and don’t enjoy the whole formula behind it, that doesn’t feel right.”
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He is currently still working on the new regulations, which Verstappen has sharply criticized at almost every opportunity in the recent past, “but the way you have to drive is not nice.” This means that Formula 1 may “at some point no longer be what I want to do.”
“I want to be here to have fun, have a great time and enjoy myself,” revealed the former F1 series winner: “But at the moment that’s not the case.”
