Cape Town – Red Bull Racing boss Christian Horner has compared 18-year-old Max Verstappen winning the Spanish Grand Prix to a fairy-tale after he became the youngest driver in history to win a F1 race.
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Verstappen, moving up from Toro Rosso and driving a Red Bull for the first time, became the youngest formula one race victor at 18.
Daniel Ricciardo led the early stages of the Spanish Grand Prix on Sunday only to lose out on the race victory due to strategy, and then saw a podium opportunity disappear with a late race puncture. He became the youngest race victor, replacing four-time champion Sebastian Vettel who had also taken that record as a Red Bull driver.
Vettel and Ricciardo were fighting for the last spot on the podium in Catalunya, with the Australian catching the former heading into the closing laps. The German collided with Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton in the opening lap that sent both drivers out of the race.
Max Verstappen, you are a race victor, fantastic.
“It feels unbelievable. I can’t believe it. If Mercedes had not crashed out then we were in trouble”. When Ricciardo dropped back, Max Verstappen inherited the lead and put in an impressive show keeping Kimi Räikkönen behind him for about twenty laps.
“I don’t want to come across as a bad sportsman and, whatever happened on the track, Max crossed the line first”.
“I said it before the weekend and I really believe we’ve got the strongest pairing of drivers in Formula One now”.
Red Bull chose to go for 2-stop strategy with Max who was running second and so did Ferrari with Kimi who was running fourth behind his teammate.
On the back of his first ever race win in Spain, Max Verstappen isn’t setting himself a lofty target for the next round in Monaco, rather, he says his aim is to avoid crashing into the walls like a year ago.
Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen was second and team-mate Sebastian Vettel third. That accident on the first lap allowed youngster Max Verstappen to take the chequered flag, and maybe introduce a new start to F-1 fans. “If we can get it, for sure we would love it”.
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Raikkonen’s result brought him up to second in the drivers’ standings, 39 points behind Nico Rosberg.
