“He saw a message on the steering wheel”– Max Verstappen a victim of misunderstanding?

“He saw a message on the steering wheel”– Jos Verstappen complains about the bad communication between his son and Red Bull management.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was cornered by Mercedes’ two pit stop strategy with Lewis Hamilton, which forced the former to lose his position at the top by the end of the race.

However, even in the first pitstop made by Verstappen, his pit crew team disappointed him with a poor pitstop that made him lose a couple of seconds more, a rare mistake by Red Bull’s efficient crew.

Talking about this, Jos Verstappen said that the poor pitstop was because of the poor communication between the management and Verstappen during the race.

“When Max drove over start-finish, he saw a message on the steering wheel which made him think he had to come in for a stop the following lap,” he explained to The Telegraph explained. “So then you go that last lap one hundred percent, to make up as much time as possible.”

Hope they improve

Verstappen Snr. then hopes that Red Bull improves in this department, as previously also Max made a mistake in Imola if the Milton Keynes based team wishes to contest for the championship.

“I’m sure the team will think about how they can do it better next time in terms of communication. Max did make a mistake during qualifying in Imola, he admitted that himself. Afterwards a problem was found, but we don’t want to use that as an excuse.”

Hamilton has a 14-point lead over Verstappen, and Mercedes has a 29 point lead over Red Bull, with 19 more races to go. With the Monaco Grand Prix set to happen this week, it remains to be seen where the race between the two powerhouses leads after this week.

Verstappen only needs to hope for a Mercedes debacle in the coming weeks to change his fortune, considering the whole momentum of the season is in Mercedes’ court right now.

About the author

Tanish Chachra

Tanish Chachra is the Motorsport editor at The SportsRush. He saw his first race when F1 visited India in 2011, and since then, his romance with the sport has been seasonal until he took up this role in 2020. Reigniting F1's coverage on this site, Tanish has fallen in love with the sport all over again. He loves Kimi Raikkonen and sees a future world champion in Oscar Piastri. Away from us, he loves to snuggle inside his books.

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