Max after Friday in Bahrain: 'I don't like it at all'
Published on 05 December 2020 by Mike Motilall
After the first two free practices for the Sakhir Grand Prix, Max Verstappen spoke with Olav Mol for the show Formula 1 Café, which is aired during the Formula 1-season every Friday evening at 22.30 on Ziggo Sport channel 14 and Ziggo Sport Select.
On the question, by Olav Mol, whether he adjusted his ride height, Max says: “Small things, like e.g. the angle of the wings, then you also need to adjust the ride height. With less or more downforce the car has of course less or more pressure pushing down on it so you need to adjust the ride height.” Do you actually drive a completely different car then? “Not that different, because there are still some corners.”
Do you drive with a different engine mode than a week ago, because of the straights? “No, but the energy is dispersed differently, and you’re always going flat out.”
Is it physically tougher or easier than last week? “There is nothing to it actually”. It's not much fun? “I don’t like it at all. I don’t think it’s a race track. It’s so short and the corners make no sense at all. Apart from that it’s just too dangerous: you are constantly busy communicating with your engineer about traffic as you are taking blind corners. That is very tricky. And for what? It feels like they want to make an entertainment show out of it, to make it more exciting and ultimately that won’t be the case because the fastest car will still be at the front.”
How is the tyre wear? “It was a bit better than on the regular track because there are less corners and less slow corners in it, so it’s a bit better regarding traction. Here the tyres wear harder because of the traction in the slower corners. There is actually just only one slow corner on this track. So it’s a bit better, but they still wear out quite a lot.”
Sunday 87 laps. Is that hard on the brakes? “I still am not able to go flat out because the tyres can’t handle that. You will still need to lift and ease it down a bit. If you want to run as fast as you can then the tyres will heat up.”
Contest GP Sakhir: win a Max Verstappen RB12 Japan 1:43 scale model!
