Max Verstappen must leave Red Bull to become a Formula One legend
If you are at all ambivalent about Max Verstappen’s latest feat, consider the fact that he has just won a Formula One world title in only the third-best car.
This alone elevates him far above Sebastian Vettel, his forerunner in claiming four consecutive championships at Red Bull. While the German’s quadruple owed much to his supreme machinery, with his team comfortably taking the constructors’ crown every year from 2010 to 2013, Verstappen has prevailed at a time when technical performance has fallen off a cliff. For all that Christian Horner insists this achievement is a collective “f--- you” to the critics, it is better portrayed as a study in individual brilliance.
Verstappen’s great gift is to stay cool as the house burns down around him. Even amid the unseemly machinations pitting his father, Jos, against Horner, he ensured his results on track did not suffer. Even when Adrian Newey, the Da Vinci of Formula One, departed in the wake of a power struggle, he kept a surging Lando Norris firmly in his rear-view mirrors. And even when Red Bull’s customary ruthlessness deserted them, with their failure to jettison a declining Sergio Pérez costing them dearly, the indestructible Dutchman spared Horner’s blushes.
It is doubtful whether he can steady a listing ship again next season. For all his extraordinary resilience en route to title No 4, scoring more than twice as many points as his team-mate, rivals are advancing at a rate to suggest the second Red Bull empire is crumbling. He can hardly be expected to carry Pérez again when McLaren are mounting a two-pronged challenge with Norris and Oscar Piastri, or when Ferrari are revitalised by the sight of Lewis Hamilton in red. And, so, a familiar question, first sparked by a dinner in Dubai this year between Verstappen snr and Toto Wolff, resurfaces: does the all-conquering Max need to move elsewhere to attain historic greatness?
The very idea is fraught with complication. Verstappen is under contract until 2028, while Mercedes have shored up their immediate future by promoting Kimi Antonelli to an F1 seat alongside George Russell. But should the Italian rookie falter, or Verstappen lose patience with Red Bull falling behind in the arms race, Wolff would be the first to pounce. While the Mercedes team principal gave up during the summer on any hope of tempting Verstappen for 2025, he has, tellingly, left the door ajar to sign him in 2026. “I’m entering the season in 2025 with two drivers who will be given the opportunity to perform,” he said. “That’s why I don’t want to talk about the 2026 line-up at this stage – I want to make it work with George and Kimi.”
Such success is far from guaranteed. Can the 18-year-old Antonelli truly be expected to make an instant impact given that he is only sixth in the Formula Two standings this season? An unconvincing rookie campaign at the highest level, coupled with the state of flux at Red Bull, would surely pave the way for the blockbuster spectacle of Verstappen at the Silver Arrows. F1 will undergo a drastic regulation change for 2026, with cars downsized in the latest attempt to produce closer racing. And if any team can exploit such a seismic shift to their advantage, it is Mercedes.
True, they botched the 2022 rules rewrite, with their porpoising car condemned to failure by the ultra-reliable Red Bull. But they delivered a masterstroke at the dawn of the turbo-hybrid era in 2014, setting Hamilton on a path to become champion in five of the next six years. The thought of Verstappen timing a move to Mercedes with similar perfection is tantalising. For the brutal truth is that there is a limit to how much he can ever be loved at Red Bull.
Vettel understood this when he jumped ship to Ferrari in 2015, swapping his association with an energy drink for the peerless grandeur of the Prancing Horse. But it did not work out, and it was for this reason that he was never accorded the same reverence as his fellow four-time champions. Juan Manuel Fangio, Alain Prost, Michael Schumacher, Lewis Hamilton: all, crucially, tasted glory with more than one team. Vettel, by contrast, failed to script an encore without Newey’s rocketship underneath him. The same crossroads will soon confront Verstappen. Does he dare forsake the carefully-curated Red Bull brand for some true F1 heritage? If he hopes to cement his legend for posterity, he needs to make the leap sooner rather than later.