It was not the race win Max Verstappen would have hoped for at the Spanish Grand Prix, but the Dutchman was ‘happy’ to finish second between the Mercedes cars, even though he sounded angry and frustrated on team radio at various points during the race …
Starting as third, Verstappen, winner of the last race at Silverstone, jumped ahead of Valtteri Bottas at the start to run second, but could not make in-dikes in race leader Lewis Hamilton and could not react after that when the Mercedes started away to draw.
READ MORE: Dominant Hamilton makes it easier after the fifth Spanish GP win, when Verstappen splits Mercedes
From there, he comfortably held on to second to keep his 100% record of scoring a stage in races he has completed this year (five of six).
“The start was OK and then I was able to enter Lewis’ tow so I could pass Valtteri in Turn 1 and from there I tried to follow Lewis a bit,” he said. ‘Of course it was just managing tires at first, so I tried to back out of that too, but of course Valtteri’s came back in P3, so you can not fall back too much.
Spanish Grand Prix: Stepping argument with Red Bull on team radio
“When Lewis was pushing a little harder, I could not keep up, and he just drove away. From then on I just tried to do my own pace and do the fastest strategy we could do, and stay for Valtteri and that worked pretty well today, so I’m happy about that. We split the two Mercedes cars up again, so I do not think there can be much more at the moment. “
But what about those spicy team radio messages? As you can see and hear in the video above, the Dutchman made his voice heard at various points as he complained about the condition of his tires and the fact that he felt his team should focus on his race instead of on what Hamilton and Bottas served.
Read more: Leclerc had ‘good chance’ of P6 before hitting electrical problems and undoing belts
“At the end of the day, you can not control what they do, you can only control what we do, so we just have to make sure we do the fastest strategy for us,” he said in explaining his messages.
“I wanted to joke, and they did not call me. I had a lot of trouble with the tires and I forgot a lot of lap time in the last two laps and I already said on the radio that I do not care if you put me behind the Racing “Points, because I will pass them on easily, because we are much faster, especially on new tires. That was the conversation.”
He may not have won ground on Hamilton in the riders’ championship, now 37 points behind, but Verstappen is now six clear of Bottas in second place.
Verstappen says that splitting Mercedes at Spanish Grand Prix was ‘more than good’
