There is no doubt about Max Verstappen’s tendency to get angry and frustrated while participating in a race, be it a real-life Grand Prix or a virtual race. Besides his expletive team radio chatter in F1, the Dutchman also lashes out angrily during sim-racing events such as the Virtual Le Mans.
A similar instance happened recently during the virtual 24 Hours of Daytona, when Verstappen‘s teammates poked fun at him and called him a “diva” for his whiny behavior. It was, in fact, a chat response on the Twitch stream, where Team Redline was streaming and chatting together during the race.
Curious why they thought so, Verstappen asked, “Why am I a Diva“. Interestingly, Verstappen himself answered this question by reading out the literal Cambridge Dictionary definition of a “diva” — “a person who is difficult to please and behaves as if they are very special or important”. This led one of his teammates to say, “Ah, so it is you”.
max: “why am i a diva?”
do you think he gets it by now pic.twitter.com/ckraxEeBdF
— nini (@SCUDERIAFEMBOY) January 17, 2025
These kinds of banter moments often happen during Team Redline streams where Verstappen is the target of many jokes. The Dutchman does take it sportingly and the clips of his reactions and comments start to trend on social media.
His outburst during the virtual Le Mans event in 2023 also became viral as Verstappen was quite unhappy with how the server kept disconnecting him from the race. The Red Bull driver’s frustration was justified as they lost the chance to win that event due to the connectivity issues.
Nevertheless, this time around in the virtual Daytona event, everything seems to be going smoothly with Verstappen and his teammates having some fun too. During their casual racing sessions, this banter is further amplified.
When Verstappen was teased about the Dutch national anthem
Verstappen had an extraordinary 2023 F1 campaign, winning 19 out of the 22 races. So, the Dutch national anthem being played on the podium became a norm, and a rather boring one for the fans as well as Verstappen.
Since the Dutchman got so used to his national anthem, he once did not want to listen to any more of it. After one of his teammates randomly played the Dutch national anthem during one of his sim racing streams, Verstappen said, “No come on, stop this s**t”.
However, his winless run of 10 races after the Spanish GP in 2024 would have mellowed down this feeling for Verstappen. The 27-year-old was more than happy to welcome the same prank as his teammates emulated it in the middle of his win drought. This time, he said, “I would actually like to hear it, it’s been a while”.
With Red Bull expected to struggle in 2025 as well, Verstappen may covet hearing the Dutch national anthem as often as possible, in turn, eking out race wins.
