Max Verstappen, sitting in front of a “2022 World Champion” banner and reclining on a red throne, can be heard openly asking “have I or haven’t I” at the end of the Japanese Grand Prix. ? That was the question on everyone’s lips: Did he do enough to compete in four races for his second World Championship?
It was one of the saddest finishes in the history of a Formula 1 championship. Red Bull team bosses were left in frustration as they studied the rule books to see if the man had won.
After a lifetime of uncomfortable looks among the denizens of the cold room, the FIA has confirmed Verstappen as world champion. His shoulders slumped, his chest relaxed and a big smile spread across his face. Charles Leclerc was given a five-place grid penalty, which meant Sergio Perez moved up to second place; Furthermore, the rules unexpectedly awarded full points in half-distance races, although new rules were introduced this year to prevent that from happening.
So Verstappen took his second world title and once again made his name in the history books. But this time he felt different. After a difficult start to the season, he dominated, in a league of his own, and showed great maturity in and out of the car.
After the opening three races, Verstappen was 46 points behind Leclerc’s Ferrari. The Red Bull driver effectively ran out of fuel in the opening race in Bahrain, beating Leclerc to victory in Saudi Arabia, but a fuel leak in Australia reduced Verstappen to a point again. Leclerc’s two wins and second win put him at 71 points. All signs point to a resurgence for Ferrari, with Verstappen facing a renewed threat to defend the title.
Since then, Verstappen has won 11 of 15 races. The season as a whole was a stark contrast to the sensational 2021 campaign. The collision with Lewis Hamilton at Silverstone and Monza. The tire gut-punched with six laps to go to win the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. And of course that famous conclusion in Abu Dhabi.
The 2022 title-decider was also controversial, though for other reasons. And this year Verstappen proved to be annihilating his opponents, finishing with four races to go for the title.
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Verstappen, now a double world champion, said his latest victory “showed him very different feelings” compared to 2021.
“last year, [fighting] It might be the worst feeling until the last race. Because then I don’t think we’re fast anymore, so that doesn’t help either. This year I think it’s very, very different in emotions from the beginning of the year.
“But both [titles] They are beautiful and both are good to practice at the end of the day. It’s also good to always have pressure and do each lap at your own pace. But not for many years in a row. So at this point in time I was very happy with the past year.
The 2021 season was the last for F1’s legacy cars. This year it brought new machines designed to compete together.
“For any season [was] Very different,” explained Verstappen. “Now you’re starting with completely different cars, a completely different way of racing.
“Then of course [there’s] The amount of competition we’ve won, but they’ve all come in different ways.
Of his dozen wins, Verstappen has only won from pole four times this year, a clear contrast to last season. “Last year they were all really qualified dependents and that’s how you win the race,” he said.
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Verstappen has won from a low of 14th on the grid this year, for example at Spa-Francorchamps he passed the allocation of the highest power unit classes.
“Now, with some of the engine penalties coming back, it’s been a really interesting year and a special year. [It] I think it will be very difficult to match myself in the future.
“That’s why I think we should really appreciate him and be very happy. We were already enjoying ourselves, maybe we can have some fun now.
A driver who has been working in the sport since the age of 17 – not one we see in the future – is the passion he showed early in his career. After such a short training, he constantly learns on the job and sometimes has a short fuse.
In the year After crossing swords with Kimi Raikkonen at the Belgian Grand Prix in 2016, his feud with the sport’s establishment turned to anger. At the start of the race, they made contact at the source, and Verstappen then fired Raikkonen hard. Block straight with a camel.
Raikkonen labeled Verstappen’s driving “ridiculous”. Another world champion, Jacques Villeneuve, fumed and suggested Verstappen was “going to kill someone” if he didn’t settle down on track. In his post-race comments, Verstappen defended his position and said: “If someone doesn’t like it, that’s their problem.”
Last year’s run-in with Hamilton led the Mercedes driver to describe Verstappen’s style as “dangerous” and “crazy”. But this kind of upheaval is largely absent in 2022.
The two very different champions beat Verstappen. Last season he was under pressure from Mercedes and the seven-time world champion. This year he got used to a completely new car that was built to follow radical rules and regulations.
The controversies surrounding the deciders of this and last year’s championships have sparked mixed opinions. But they shouldn’t diminish the quality of Verstappen’s work as he blossomed from a hard-edged young ‘star of the future’ to an impressive double world champion.
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