Russell: After Max's Hungary rant “Red Bull’s engineers sent out CV’s”
F1 News
The row between George Russell and Max Verstappen has reached new heights, with the Briton claiming that "shit has hit the fan" following the Dutchman comments regarding his attitude in the Steward's briefing, which he perceived to be personal attacks. Now Russell has fired back and claims Verstappen could actually follow up on his alleged "threat" to put him in the wall after seeing 'the fire in the Dutchman's eyes'.
Could Verstappen really put Russell in the wall?
Speaking to media present at the Yas Marina Circuit paddock, Russell claims to be unsure of what exactly Verstappen's problem with him is: "I don't really know what there is to escalate. As I said, I walked into that stewards [meeting] with no problem with Max. I walked out of that stewards [meeting] with no problem with Max". After referring to Verstappen's "shit has hit the fan" attitude and "the words he said to me", Russell thought it would all be forgotten the next day.
"I went back, I told my team [about Verstappen's attitude] and we laughed about it. Then I woke up the next day and I was expecting to have a laugh about it but as I said, I saw the fire in his eyes", said a surprised Russell, and while he clarifies that he doesn't question the current World Champion's driving abilities, he does think that, as he sees it, Verstappen's inability to deal with adversity, is the cause behind a staggering 25% of his engineers sending out CV's to rival teams following his Hungarian Grand Prix rant.
"Red Bull engineers sent CV's out because they can't deal with Verstappen"
"The second he does not have the fastest car, let's take Budapest as an example, he crashes into Lewis. He slams his whole team and he loses the plot. Straight away after that race, 25% of his engineering team were sending their CVs to Mercedes, to McLaren, to Aston Martin, because they said they can't deal with a guy like that".
After Spain, Max Verstappen has only won two Grand Prix, in Brasil over a month ago, and in last time out, in Qatar, where the saga between both drivers was ignited, which makes Russell believe that Verstappen is absolutely beatable, and that given the proper car he and teammate Lewis Hamilton have also proven to be beatable. "Since Austria, he's won the same number of races as six other drivers. So when he's saying, is Max beatable? Of course he's beatable. When he's in the most dominant car, he is not beatable. The same way as Lewis and I, when we had the most dominant car in Silverstone, in Las Vegas, we were not beatable either", closed a combative Russell.