Max Verstappen’s trusted race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase, known across the paddock as “GP” and the man on the end of multiple rants and rebukes from the four-time F1 world champion for nearly a decade, is not one for excessive superlatives.
Such is his job, now head of racing at Red Bull, he has to keep a cool head amid an often chaotic grand prix weekend, which is precisely why his reaction to Verstappen’s pole-setting lap in qualifying for the Japanese GP on Saturday was so noteworthy.
GP’s statement was simple: “That is insane,” he said to his driver over team radio. It set up Verstappen’s first win of the season, as he looks to become only the second man – after Michael Schumacher – to win five consecutive F1 world championships.
It was not in the script, either. McLaren, whether it be Lando Norris or Oscar Piastri, had led throughout the weekend practice sessions. The Australian was on provisional pole after the first flying laps in Q3, while the Briton looked set for the top of the timesheet after he put a brilliant lap together in his second run.
But Verstappen’s lap, beating Norris’s time by 0.012 seconds with a 1:26:983 – a new lap record around Suzuka – was not just brilliant. It was a scintillating 87 seconds of on-the-limit driving.
His final sector, in particular, was where he made it count, making up a two-tenths-of-a-second deficit. In F1 terms, that is substantial. With speeds between the two cars similar around the high-speed 130R left-hander, it effectively means Verstappen perfected the tricky final chicane – wrestling with the RB21 through the eye of a needle – before steering the car flawlessly close to the wall for maximum time.
"I was fully committed on the final lap,” he admitted afterwards. “At points, not sure if I was going to keep it [on the track]. If you look at how our season started, even this weekend, it is very unexpected, and that makes it a very special one."
Two-time F1 world champion Fernando Alonso, 43 and typically tough to impress, was eulogising over the Red Bull driver’s display. “Only he can do it,” Alonso said. “I think there is no other driver at the moment that can drive a car and put it so high. Higher than the car deserves.
“I think it was a magical moment for everyone here.”
From then, in the knowledge that if he retained the lead at the start the race was a long way to being won, Verstappen did exactly that. He quickly dashed hopes of an early overtake by clearing the one-second DRS margin to Norris in second and, aside from the pit-lane exit scuffle, was imperious as he claimed his fourth successive win at Suzuka.
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Norris, now championship leader by just one point, could not help but tip his hat to the four-time champion.
"Congrats to Max, he did a good job,” he said. “You have to credit something when it’s a lap that good that he must have done.
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“I’m happy because I feel like I got everything out of the car today. [The gap] it’s tiny. Was there probably that much in it? Yes, but Max did an amazing lap.”
Red Bull boss Christian Horner added: “Unbelievable. We did not expect that and, about Max, what can you say? Just an outstanding lap. He’s extracted every ounce of performance.
“With Max, he left nothing on the table. That was one of his best laps in qualifying ever.”
In a week where all the spotlight was placed on Verstappen’s new teammate Yuki Tsunoda – who finished a disappointing 12th on his debut for Red Bull – the Dutchman gave a stark reminder as to why the temperamental Red Bull car is geared in an unorthodox fashion to his preferences.
It also sends a clear and pointed title message to the quickest team, McLaren. While the constructors’ champions still have the quickest car, a driver of Verstappen’s quality can exquisitely eke the maximum out of a car which, arguably, is fourth-quickest on the grid. Three races in, it is very much a three-horse title battle, alongside Norris and Oscar Piastri, in the drivers’ championship.
And as is often the case at the end of a race-winning weekend for the Dutchman, he set the tone for the next race in Bahrain next week with a boastful statement. Boastful, but accurate.
Asked how he would have fared if he had driven the McLaren car in Japan, he replied: “I don’t even want to think about if I’d been in that other car [McLaren]. Then you wouldn’t have seen me!”
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