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marko responds to quarrel horner and verstappen: kindergarten

Marko reacts to war between Horner and Jos Verstappen: 'Kindergarten'

28 June at 17:12
  • Ludo van Denderen

On a day when Max Verstappen put his Red Bull Racing car on pole for the sprint race at the Red Bull Ring, the talk of the day was not about another top performance by the world champion. It was Jos Verstappen and Christian Horner who got in the spotlight this Friday in Austria.

Jos Verstappen announced on Friday morning that he would not participate in the Legends Parade, which takes place on Sunday. Max's father was supposed to drive in an old Red Bull Racing F1 car. But the former driver declared he will not participate, saying Horner had "done everything possible" to prevent him from driving. Horner, incidentally, denied that.

Marko responds to riot at Red Bull

Helmut Marko has also heard the conflict in the media. During an exclusive interview with GPblog the Austrian initially did not want to respond: "You have to ask Jos or Christian about this," Marko first said. He then added anyway: "But I think this is kindergarten."

Much rather, Marko was talking about the performance of Verstappen, who took pole for the sprint race in Austria in the last moment. Where, according to Marko, did the Dutchman take the win over Lando Norris' McLaren? "We were generally better in turns six and seven. But the secret was that we had found the balance and setup here immediately in the first practice session; that it was just improving on details. And Max brought that to optimum maturity."

Marko does not want to cheer too soon

In recent weeks, Red Bull had struggled with the RB20. This time Marko's conclusion was: "Today it was a good Max in a good car." And that bodes well for the future, it seems: "I hope some of our problems have been solved. I think we will know more after Silverstone."

In the Sprint Shootout, the 10 drivers in SQ3 waited until the very last moment to do their qualifying lap. Charles Leclerc even crossed the starting line too late to set a fast time. Marko found the long wait by everyone very strange. "Not wise, not wise! Everyone thinks the track is developing and getting a second faster. Those are thousandths at most! Then they come onto the track and everyone has to kill their outlap pace. So you don't get anything out of it."