Although he is classed as Dutch, Red Bull Racing's Max Verstappen was actually born in Belgium as well as Holland and therefore this weekend's Belgian Grand prix is another home event for him and the stands will be full of orange clad Verstappen fans.
As any driver at his home grand prix, Max will love the added attention from the stands that will give him that added boost when he is needing it the most.
Here he speaks with the press at Thursday's official FIA Press conference…
Max, a front row qualifier here last season, still the only time in your F1 career to date, so long overdue another one. Is this more or less feasible this year than last year?
I don't know. Have I been on the second row this year? I don't know. I think it will be more difficult, but you never know. In general, Red Bull has always been quite OK on this track. We just have to wait and see. It will be quite a special weekend, with so many fans around, so I'm definitely looking forward to that.
And I see you've got the orange on the cap – nice touch. You and Red Bull Racing have made quite a radical tyre selection for this weekend, with only one set of softs and nine sets of ultrasofts – much less conservative than Mercedes and Ferrari. In light of the way things went at Silverstone, are you confident you have the right tyre options for the weekend??
I'll tell you after tomorrow!
Can you tell us a bit more, develop your thoughts on what tomorrow might bring?
Yeah, I don't know. We just have to go out there and see what the balance of the car is and then of course we try some different tyres and we know the degradation and from there on we'll go further into the weekend.
But you would describe this a quite an aggressive selection, clearly?
Looks like. Yep.
Max, there will be approximately 80,000 Dutch fans here this weekend – a lot of orange on the stands. Does it give you extra pressure?
Yeah, I think positive pressure. It's always nice to see so many fans around, especially let's say in qualifying. When you cross the line and you do your lap, hopefully they are cheering, last year they were, so it was good. For sure it brings more pressure but you have to translate that into something positive,
Max, you cause a hype with an invasion of your Netherlands countrymen, who will freak out this weekend, but you are Dutch?
Born in Belgium as well.
You were also asking if you qualified in the second row this year? You've done it twice this year: Monaco and Silverstone.
I did? Oh.
Max, you raced with Esteban before in F3. He has been one year in Formula One. Can I have your opinion about Esteban and his year in F1?
I think clearly everything is going alright. It's a bit difficult for me to judge as I'm not involved in the team and exactly all that is going on but it's clearly going really well. As a driver I always had good competition with Esteban so for sure he's a good driver.
This week Formula One has announced an e-sports championship for F1. How do all feel about that being that you have all had a chance to play these games – Esteban we've watched you on social media putting some lap times down – to have this championship, to have some young people in an untapped market step in and be part of the F1 community? Max, you do a lot of this stuff, don't you?
Yeah. Lately not that much in terms of racing any more but I think in general it took quite a long time compared to some other sports but it's always very positive to have it. If you already look into some other sports at how big it became, it's really interesting to see, so I'm looking forward to how big it can become.
It's not only the Dutch fans here, you also have a warm relationship with Spa-Francorchamps, just talking to the circuit. Can you take us through the most difficult and more beautiful part of the lap, for you?
Most difficult… I think that changes every year with the car balance you have. I like the second sector where you have a lot of fast corners in a row. I think that's definitely the most beautiful as well to take because, at the end of the day, Eau Rouge is very nice, the scenery is very nice but it's easy flat-out at the moment.
Most difficult?
Sector Two. It depends on what car balance you have.
Max, you have a new version of the power unit here from Renault. Do you believe with this possible upgrade from the power unit and the characteristics of your car normally very well adapted for this track, you can be very close to Mercedes and Ferrari or maybe even beat them?
To be honest I think it's just a bit of fine tuning. I don't expect any miracles to happen here. I think like they said as well, it's just mapping and controls, so it's not like giving you suddenly a lot more horsepower.
For the start of the second half of the season, you've had four weeks off. What did the three of you get up to during that period of time and what proportion was training and what proportion was holiday?
I had 11 days off, and even on the holiday, of course you do some training, to stay up to date. From there onwards you just do your normal thing again.
Max, when some incidents happen during the race, and there is a crash or something like what happened in Hungary, what are your feelings after that? Is it ‘I'm not doing that again' or ‘I'm fighting like hell and these things can happen.” Which are your feelings?
You try to learn from it and from there on, maybe you analyse it once to see exactly, also from different camera angles. You know that from there on you know you have to go forwards and you try to forget it.
Max, also about the incident with Daniel. Did you speak with Daniel afterwards – or maybe recently about it. Is the air clear now?
Of course. Already straight after the race we had a talk and cleared all the air. We shared our opinions, then we had our holiday. I saw Daniel again today. At the end of the day, we are racing drivers. It's one race and we are not fighting for a World Championship. That's a different story. We just go on and try to score some points.
From a very realistic point of view, what are your goals from now until the rest of the season?
I think the approach it race-by-race and try to achieve the best you can. Especially after the first half I've had: you don't look at the championship position or whatever. You just try to do what you can do every single weekend and try to be closer to the top two teams and hopefully that will also bring us into a better position for next year.
Max, you feel like the future, right?
To be honest, feel like the future? I just try to do the best I can every single weekend and hopefully that's enough, of course.
