The renewal of Max Verstappen with Red Bull until the end of the 2028 season marked a before and after for the transfer market in Formula 1. The signing of the Dutchman with the energy drinks team is the largest contract ever has made in the category, surpassing agreements such as that of Charles Leclerc, who once was linked to Ferrari for five years.
The current world champion arrived at the Milton Keynes team in 2016 in a brilliant way, achieving the first victory of his career and that of a youngest driver in history in the debut with the Austrians. Since then he has not stopped surprising the paddock until he won the world title, for which Red Bull offered him a contract never seen before.
The 24-year-old Dutchman is a true Formula 1 star, and the nearly 50 million euros that he adds to his coffers each season with this agreement are proof of this.
However, Max Verstappen does not rule out leaving the Red Bull structure when he completes this cycle, and allows himself to be loved by two other powerful teams on the grid, nothing more and nothing less than Ferrari and Mercedes.
When Motorsport-magazin.com asked the Dutchman if he was thinking of leaving the team with which he has been world champion, despite expressing his agreement, he was not closed to other options in the future .
“I have no reason to leave because I get on well with the team, and our package is competitive,” he said. “Of course, when my contract expires, I will only be 31 years old, and then I will still have the opportunity to decide whether I want to continue or not.”
“I will not be old, I can even look around at a team like Ferrari or Mercedes,” said Verstappen, thus starting the rumors of what seemed unthinkable when his renewal was announced.
In this 2022 season he has shown to have increased his maturity, making very few mistakes on the track and having a clean fight with Charles Leclerc for the world championship lead, far from what it was when he fought Lewis Hamilton, with whom he had several serious incidents.
“Every driver is different,” said the Dutch driver. “We differ in how we defend and how we attack, so we have to approach each rival in a different way.”
It seems unlikely that Verstappen will leave Red Bull until at least 2028 , when his contract expires, although this is Formula 1, and in motorsport’s top flight anything can change in a matter of seconds.
