'No combination of team and driver that can beat Verstappen'

Kovalainen opts for Verstappen

In Viaplay's F1 Talks programme, Kovalainen is asked who he thinks will be the world champion in 2023 in the pinnacle of motorsport. The Finn does not have to think long about it. "Max Verstappen. He is the form of his life. There is no doubt about that."

Kovalainen continues his story at the table where Verstappen himself, Jos Verstappen and former F1 driver Giedo van der Garde are also seated. "I am a fan of Hamilton, because I've been his teammate. I've seen the great driver performing, I've seen the data I know what it takes to be at that level. The reason I say Max, not because he's sitting here right now, but simply because his team and himself are in such form that I can't see any other team or driver combination that can beat that."

Kovalainen competed for the Vodafone McLaren-Mercedes team between 2008 and 2009 as Hamilton's teammate. In his first year with the team, Hamilton went straight for the world title, while Kovalainen himself did not go beyond seventh place in the World Championship. The following year, Hamilton finished fifth in the world championship, while Kovalainen finished 12th.

Impressed by Red Bull

He finds it impressive that Red Bull has always been confident of another world title, even when the team was down from 2015. "I've seen a lot of teams come and go in Formula 1. Like Max said, they have been working for many years. It wasn't always easy and the car wasn't competitive all the time. They just kept going and going. That takes a lot of guts to do, it's not many teams that can do that. Mercedes did it in a way, they started as a different brand and they've been building up. But there are not many teams that can do that, put the money and the effort and the people, hire the best people to be successful. It takes years, that's impressive by Red Bull."