From Making F1 an 18+ Sport to Raising Concerns Over Overtaking: Here Are All the Regulations Influenced by Max Verstappen in F1

Away from the records and the championships, Max Verstappen has made another significant contribution to the sport, which is influencing F1 to such an extent that they had to bring about significant changes as things went on. With information gathered from F1 Maximaal, here’s a list of all the rules the 26-year-old influenced.

F1 became an 18+ sport

At 17 years and 166 days, Max Verstappen became the youngest driver in the history of F1 to take part in a race weekend when he drove for Toro Rosso in 2015. FIA took note of the same and felt the need to bring about an important change in the regulations, especially seeing 17-year-olds could not drive passenger cars on roads. Thus, a ruling came which specified that all debutants must be 18 years old to enter the sport.

Additionally, given Verstappen’s lack of driving experience, another rule came, which said that a driver must have at least 40 points across various entry-level classes if they wanted to secure a super license.

A (temporary) braking rule came into force thanks to Max Verstappen

It is hardly a surprise that the Red Bull driver is one of the most aggressive drivers on the current grid. The Dutchman not only opts for aggressive maneuvers when trying to overtake others, but he also does so when defending his position by braking and leaving the racing line. FIA took note of the same and labeled the driving as ‘dangerous.’

Owing to the same, the authorities enforced a rule that said drivers could not leave their line when braking, and if found guilty of the same, they would be penalized accordingly. An additional line in the rule read, ‘No car may be driven in a way that causes danger to other drivers.’

However, the rule did not last long, as the FIA decided to scrap it and give drivers more freedom during on-track face-offs.

The AD21 incident brought an important one-word change to a rule

Turning back the clock to perhaps the most controversial incident in the recent history of the sport, Verstappen won the 2021 Abu Dhabi GP and, with it, his first-ever F1 world title after a curious call by race director Michael Masi.

With the safety car out in the final laps of the race, Lewis Hamilton led while Verstappen was in P2. Five lapped cars stood in between the two drivers, with race control allowing them to go past the safety car and join the queue.

While the lapped cars moved away from the race leader, they would still be in the way, given the race would restart the next lap, causing problems for certain drivers. The interpretation by Masi perhaps cost Hamilton a historic eighth drivers’ title, bringing about a change in the ambiguous “any lapped cars” rule to a specific “all lapped cars” rule.

Max Verstappen must respect the train

Another issue in the AD21 incident was the fact that by the time the safety car was coming in, Verstappen was driving almost parallel to Hamilton, raising concern within the Brackley-based camp.

Ultimately found not guilty, Verstappen secured an all-important win. He opted for a similar tactic in Bahrain in 2022 but did not secure a similar result. The FIA took note of this and banned any similar practice during any race.

The second title brought more questions to Verstappen’s door

The 2022 Japanese GP ended under confusing circumstances around the points distribution method. Given the race only reached 53% completion, Verstappen was liable to secure the full extent of points. However, if it ended under red flag conditions, the Dutchman would only get 19 points, which wouldn’t have been enough for him to enjoy a title party after the race.

Despite the head honchos of the authorities defending the decision, a rule change soon followed. Now, the number and/or percentage of laps completed is taken into account if a race ended prematurely to dictate the number of points each driver would get.

Can Max Verstappen overtake in the pits?

The latest rule change owing to Vegas antics came not so long ago, when the Dutchman ended up overtaking Hamilton and George Russell in the pit lane, citing the out-lap time limits. This resulted in the Mercedes drivers questioning Verstappen’s move, which led to authorities banning drivers from overtaking each other in the pit lane.