Adrian Newey shares his take on Mercedes’ reaction to Max Verstappen’s 2021 triumph over Lewis Hamilton

Adrian Newey believes Mercedes struggled to accept Max Verstappen’s victory at the 2021 Abu Dhabi GP. Speaking on the High Performance Podcast ahead of the 2024 Azerbaijan GP, the renowned engineer reflected on Mercedes’ reaction to the controversial race and how the Dutchman coped with the aftermath internally.

Taking after the 2021 Abu Dhabi GP, Max Verstappen and Red Bull Dashing confronted noteworthy backfire for their win, with numerous crediting the triumph to a petulant choice by FIA Race Executive Michael Masi. This controversy cleared out a shadow over Verstappen’s first world championship, with Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton feeling they had been unreasonably

denied the title. The aftermath from that race has continued into ensuing seasons and remains a hot point. Whereas Newey was to a great extent unaffected by the feedback, he considers Mercedes’ mental approach was profoundly affected.

When inquired on the off chance that the 2021 Abu Dhabi GP contention influenced him by and by, Newey reacted:

“No. No it didn’t [influence me]. I think it ought to Mercedes. Rather than saying ‘OK, we are going acknowledge it and move on’ it begun to influence their mind, which is an interesting one. That’s from the exterior. I may well be totally off-base. They couldn’t let it go mentally. In case you’ve got a awful race, maybe you ought to have won and the grisly thing broke down on the final lap or anything. I continuously had a individual issue. I will be shocking to be around any airplane terminal on that Sunday evening, but come Monday morning, I have to be wake up and be back on it. I can’t go into the plant all hopeless and downbeat. Portion of my position, I assume, is to assist and ideally persuade everybody—not saying ‘it’s so unjustifiable, we were robbed.’ It doesn’t offer assistance, does it?”
Inquired how Max Verstappen managed with the feedback over the 2021 Abu Dhabi GP finale, Newey clarified:

“Max is so confident. Usually in a positive way, not a negative way. There’s self-importance and there’s confident. He’s not pompous, but he’s confident, self-confident. He’s a deep-thinker, but he doesn’t let things like that… I do not think they truly get to him. He’s able to closed that off and get on with that work, doing what he loves doing, which is driving hustling cars.” 
Adrian Newey highlights the strengths and unique abilities of Max Verstappen
Adrian Newey believes Max Verstappen possesses a remarkable ability to drive and process the technical aspects of the car simultaneously. He admires the Dutchman’s impressive spare capacity, allowing him to not only highlight issues with the car, but also analyze its performance while driving. He has also praised Verstappen’s rare ability to read the race by watching the trackside screens and interpreting data. Newey noted that only a few top drivers, including Fernando Alonso, are capable of analyzing the race in this way while managing their own car’s data.

Inquired around Max Verstappen’s strengths as a driver, Newey clarified:

“I think that he’s exceptionally shrewdly, and he’s got an mind blowing capacity to… It feels as in the event that he can drive the car consequently. He doesn’t, of course, but he can drive the car and has so much handling control cleared out over that he can at that point think a lot approximately how he’s driving the car, how he’s looking after the tires, what he might got to do on the settings. Or on the off chance that he doesn’t, in case he’s not beyond any doubt, inquire GP [Gianpiero Lambiase, Verstappen’s race build] on the radio what he ought to be doing, but highlighting the problems.”

When inquired almost another uncommon ability of Max Verstappen, Newey said:

“Reading the race. It still captivates me. Fernando is another one who can do that. He appears to be able to studied the race. But having got all the stuff before them, how do they do that? I do not know. A few of them can too see on the down vision, they now and then do that where drivers can see down the vision and see up and see the screen. I think it’s uncommon, and as it were the exceptionally best folks can do it.”

Not each driver employments the trackside screens to take after the activity over the framework. Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso, in any case, are known to reference information from these screens amid the race and hand-off data to their engineers. The trackside screens are ordinarily expansive shows planning for fans within the grandstands to take after the race. Whereas Newey has presently been reported as a Overseeing Specialized Accomplice and a shareholder at Aston Martin, there’s continuous hypothesis approximately Verstappen conceivably joining the Silverstone group in 2026 and past.

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