Max Verstappen has wielded the power of his Red Bull RB19 and dominated Formula 1 in 2023. The most astonishing factor is the gap he has to his teammate at every race. The points table reflects this as well. Max Verstappen is currently 177 points ahead of his teammate and might win the championship in the Qatar Sprint Race. Toto Wolff called this gap out at Zandvoort, terming it ‘odd’ and ‘bizarre’. Lando Norris has rubbished those comments.
1.3s Gap in Qualifying
At Zandvoort, Max Verstappen was 1.3s ahead of his Red Bull teammate in Q3. Toto Wolff noted, “Checo [Perez] is not an idiot. We have seen it always, he is a multiple Grand Prix winner. I cannot comprehend it. We’ve seen that Max has this ability to create a car for himself which is very tricky to control but fast if you can, and it makes those gaps like the 1.3 seconds. I haven’t heard any explanation of course but yes, odd.”
Christian Horner said Toto Wolff lacks Formula 1 knowledge to be making these claims. Max Verstappen used some more colourful words. Recently, Lando Norris has called out these comments as untrue.
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“It’s Our Job to Deliver”
Lando Norris was very firm in his statements about how a Formula 1 team makes its car. He said it’s simply not logical to tailor a car to just one driver. Instead, a team like Red Bull will focus on making the fastest car it can. And then, it’s up to the driver to drive it.
Lando Norris said, “Max said something very similar the other day after Toto made the comment about the Red Bull. I don’t think you can just design a car for someone. It just doesn’t work like that. It’s very much down to the driver to drive the car they’re given.”
Drivers “Paid Enough”
Lando Norris continued, “I think what people fail to understand sometimes from the outside is that a driver’s job is to drive whatever car they are given as quickly as possible. Yes, you want the car to be nice to you and suit you.”
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“But drivers get they get paid enough money to make the best of every circumstance. Whether it’s a car they like, they don’t like is tricky, is safe, whatever it is. It’s our job to go and just drive what the team give us.”