General
Vasseur wants to put pressure on Max: 'With more pressure, more mistakes'
Frederic Vasseur saw a virtually faultless Max Verstappen this year in Formula 1. However, the Ferrari team boss thinks the three-time world champion will have more mistake holes next year, provided the competition manages to increase the pressure a little further.
"Not natural that someone has a doubt on this but he did a mega season," Vasseur stated in Abu Dhabi after the last race of the season to GPblog and others. "He was fighting with Checo the first two races or three events and then he was on another planet but clearly he didn't do a mistake on this season."
The Frenchman further states: "I think even when he struggled in qualifying in Jeddah was due to a mechanical issue and then he was always there always taking good start no contact. The only one was Vegas," he is referring to the fact that Charles Leclerc did get pushed to the outside by Verstappen at the start. For that, Verstappen also got a five-second time penalty.
Little pressure for Verstappen
So a flawless Verstappen, but Vasseur says that is also due to the fact that the RB19 was so dominant. There was virtually no pressure. "The only issue for us is that, as everybody, he will do more mistakes when he will be under pressure. Nobody was able to put him under pressure this season, except us, the last two or three events. Except Carlos in Singapore, and it's where he started to do some mistakes, or perhaps at Red Bull did some mistakes in terms of set-up, and we were too far away to put this kind of pressure on them."
With six races to go, Verstappen already won the world championship this year. Never before has the battle for the title been decided so early in a season. It is up to Ferrari to be a lot more competitive in 2024.