Max Verstappen believes he has learnt more from his crash in Monaco than from becoming Formula One’s youngest-ever race winner in Barcelona. Two weeks after rewriting the record books on the Circuit de Catalunya on his race debut for Red Bull, the 18-year-old Dutch driver was brought back to earth with a bang in the most watched race of all.
Verstappen crashed into the barriers having been forced to start from the back of the grid after also finding Monte Carlo’s streets unforgiving in qualifying. “I would say disappointed of course but you learn from those weekends even more than I did in Barcelona,” said Verstappen of what he would take from the setback.”You need that sometimes to become better.”
Verstappen, a winner in Spain last month, said his confidence remained high ahead of Sunday’s Canadian Grand Prix. “I am ready to go again. It’s a week ago now, so you get over it,” he told reporters on Thursday, with the team showing increasing signs of competitiveness.
“We can challenge for podiums and sometimes victories and that’s what we have to do,” added the youngster, who moved up from junior team Toro Rosso last month.
Red Bull teammate Daniel Ricciardo missed out on the win in Monaco after the team did not have the correct tyres ready at his second pit-stop, but he had also moved on from that disappointment. “I gave it a few days to cool off,” said the Australian who had claimed his maiden pole in Monaco.
“I spoke to various people in the team and they explained what happened at the time and the situation, so it obviously was important to hear the explanation but more importantly how to move on and for it not to happen again.”
Ricciardo is confident there will be no repeat on the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, and has not given up on challenging for the title despite the 40 points gap to Nico Rosberg of Mercedes. “I knew they were going to take it seriously because it was obviously a big disappointment,” he added.”I’ve been assured if we are in that position again then it won’t happen, which is what I wanted to hear.”
“The last four weekends I felt I should have got more, so this Sunday it’s important to know we maximised everything from both sides.”