Max Verstappen doubts creep in as Red Bull fear star man won’t fulfil contract

F1 2023 season preview as Max Verstappen looks to defend title

Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko has discussed Max Verstappen’s F1 future, with a subtle suggestion that he could ditch the sport before the end of his contract. The Dutchman is flying towards a third consecutive Drivers’ Championship, but he has made no secret of the notion that he does not intend to stick around for the long haul.

By the time Verstappen completes his deal, which supposedly makes him the highest-paid driver currently on the F1 grid, he will be 31 years old. The reigning double world champion put pen to paper on his most recent contract in May last year.

Supporters are invariably keen to see him perform on F1 circuits until at least 2028, but Marko has suggested that there could be a tinge of doubt in the Red Bull camp as to whether Verstappen will even make it that far by claiming that he ‘hopes’ to see him complete the job.

“He won’t stop racing completely,” Marko told the Inside Line podcast. “I think Le Mans and things like that where he’s just going to have fun and enjoy it, he will still do this sort of racing.

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“But you can’t underestimate the pressure nowadays of Formula 1, it is 22/23 races, every week on the simulator, a lot of PR activities. It’s hard work and it’s a lot of stress and understandable. But I don’t know when, so I hope, at least, he fulfils his contract.”

Verstappen himself has often bemoaned the stresses and strains of being an F1 driver, publicly stating that he ‘will not be around for too long’ if the FIA continue to expand race weekends, having introduced more sprint races this season.

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It therefore seems unlikely that the 25-year-old will stay in the sport as long as Lewis Hamilton, 38, or Fernando Alonso, 41, who are still scrapping for race victories in 2023. Last month, Verstappen gave fans a clearer picture on his plans and ambitions for the future.

“The plan is to stay here [at Red Bull] until 2028,” he said. “I am not planning on changing teams. I am happy here and they are happy with me. But I have not made up my mind what I will do after 2028. I might stop.

“I have been in Formula One since I was 17. It has been a long time. I have done a lot of seasons in F1. I may want to do different stuff. By 31, I don’t know whether I will have peaked or where the drop-off in performance may have occurred.

“I want to do other types of races — endurance racing, for example. Maybe I will have had enough of travelling all the time. Maybe I will want an easier life and just to do the races I like.”

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