Max Verstappen pulls back the curtain on what he would do if his kid wants to be an F1 driver
Red Bull driver Max Verstappen mentioned that he hoped his kid did not want to become a Formula One driver. The four-time F1 world champion recently announced on social media that he would be becoming a father for the first time after announcing that his girlfriend Kelly Piquet was pregnant.
The couple has been going out with each other for the past four years and have often been spotted in the F1 paddock celebrating the achievements. Although the 35-year-old Brazilian model already has a five-year-old daughter named Penelope with former F1 driver Daniil Kvyat, it would be the first child for the Dutch driver.
When Max Verstappen was asked by the media if he was prepared to have his kid become a future F1 driver, he replied, via ESPN:
"I hope not. If he or she wants to do it and I see that there is talent I would support it of course, naturally, but I really hope not."
Although it was a momentous occasion for Verstappen in his life, he still has a job to do on the track this weekend at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, where he would start the race from P4 on Sunday.
Max Verstappen analyzes his qualifying session in Abu Dhabi
Red Bull driver Max Verstappen stated that he was relieved that the final qualifying session of the 2024 season was over after he qualified P5 on track but got a bump in position due to Nico Hulkenberg's three-place penalty.
Speaking with F1.com, the 27-year-old was satisfied with his performance over one lap at the Yas Marina Circuit but claimed that it was difficult to judge his laps as everyone around him was either aborting their laps or were on used tires. He said:
"In a way relieved, because it’s the final qualifying of the year! The qualifying itself, I think it was quite decent but you never really had a good [comparison] because many people kept on aborting on their new tires, so every time when I was P1 people were on scrubbed [tires] and I don’t think that of course gave a fair performance assessment.
"It just highlights also with our season with the car, it was very hard to make it work. If it works it’s good, but today I was still not very happy with the overall balance and when you really have to push to the limit, the car just becomes very peaky and that’s why I had that big moment. Probably looks good as a slide because it’s not fast but, yeah, we have to deal with that.”
Max Verstappen would be hopeful of at least getting a podium to cap off his fourth successive championship-winning season in Formula 1 as he starts the days behind Ferrari's Carlos Sainz.