{"id":79160,"date":"2025-05-06T12:46:08","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T12:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/79160\/"},"modified":"2025-05-06T12:46:08","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T12:46:08","slug":"marko-performs-max-verstappen-u-turn-amid-300m-aston-martin-rumours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/79160\/","title":{"rendered":"Marko performs Max Verstappen U-turn amid $300m Aston Martin rumours"},"content":{"rendered":"

Helmut Marko\u2019s \u201cgreat\u201d concern that Max Verstappen could leave Red Bull has \u201cdiminished\u201d, after all, the team is not in a crisis.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Although Verstappen is one of three Grand Prix winners in the F1 2025 championship, the reigning World Champion has a battle on his hands to win five titles on the trot.<\/p>\n

Could Max Verstappen leave Red Bull?<\/p>\n

McLaren\u2019s MCL39 has emerged as the dominant car over long runs, meaning that even though Verstappen<\/a> has three pole positions, he has just one solitary victory.<\/p>\n

The McLaren team-mates have shared the rest of the spoils, Oscar Piastri claiming four wins to Lando Norris\u2019 one to sit 16 points ahead of his team-mate in the Drivers\u2019 Championship<\/a> where Verstappen is a further 16 points behind Norris.<\/p>\n

It had Marko declaring after the Bahrain Grand Prix, a race in which Verstappen was sixth, that Red Bull could lose their World Champion come the end of this season unless they up their pace.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe concern is great<\/a>,\u201d Marko admitted to Sky Deutschland<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I said, improvements have to come in the near future so that he has a car with which he can win again. We have to create a basis with a car so that he can fight for the World Championship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Updating the RB21, Verstappen put his car on pole position in Saudi Arabia and again in Miami, where a new floor was in play. But he still wasn\u2019t able to stop Piastri claiming the victories, with the Dutchman second and fourth respectively.<\/p>\n

But even though he was almost 40 seconds down the road from the championship leader, Marko\u2019s concerns that Verstappen could leave have lessened.<\/p>\n

Speaking to Bild<\/strong>, he was asked about his \u2018great\u2019 concerns that he voiced after Bahrain, and replied: \u201cThat\u2019s true, but they\u2019ve already diminished.<\/p>\n

\u201cMax is loyal and then publicly committed to Red Bull. That fits in with how I see him at the moment. He is fully focused on his job here. That\u2019s why I don\u2019t think he\u2019s even thinking about a change.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the contrary. I am convinced that Max will also be racing for Red Bull in 2026.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are, however, rumours that Aston Martin have put together a $300 million offer for Verstappen to join them in a three-year deal.<\/p>\n

Marko brushed that aside.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve read that too. But I don\u2019t think that plays a big role for Max,\u201d he said. \u201cOn the one hand, he doesn\u2019t earn that much with us, and on the other, he just wants to win.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s why we have to provide him with the fastest car. We are working on that. We will soon be bringing upgrades to the car.<\/p>\n

Max Verstappen net worth revealed<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc49 Max Verstappen net worth: How the World Champion has built his incredible fortune<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc49 F1 driver net worth 2025: The 10 reported richest drivers on the F1 grid<\/a><\/p>\n

Pressed on why he is now confident that Verstappen will continue with Red Bull next season, Marko explained that while Verstappen and Red Bull won\u2019t give up in the fight to retain the World Champion, they now accept that it may not work out that way.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore the season, we talked about our expectations for 2025,\u201d he said. \u201cEveryone \u2013 including Max \u2013 agreed that defending the title is of course the goal, but we can\u2019t assume that it will work out.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will do everything we can to achieve this, but nobody can expect us to always win. We have to pick up the maximum number of points possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

But that doesn\u2019t mean the team is in a crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cCrisis is too much to say,\u201d said the 81-year-old. \u201cWe must not forget that we are the only team apart from McLaren to have won a Grand Prix and that our form has improved somewhat recently.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut we are still not satisfied. Our ambition is different. We want to win races and titles.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut for that you not only need an exceptional driver, but also the fastest car. We don\u2019t have that at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

But while Marko specifically said \u201c2026\u201d, he made no mention of the last two years of the new father\u2019s contract with Verstappen\u2019s Red Bull deal running through to the end of the F1 2028 championship.<\/p>\n

Read next: Jos Verstappen slams \u2018so stupid\u2019 FIA action after rival drivers \u2018benefitted\u2019<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Helmut Marko\u2019s \u201cgreat\u201d concern that Max Verstappen could leave Red Bull has \u201cdiminished\u201d, after all, the team is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79161,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4103],"tags":[4199,707,4200,227,225,1073,12,226,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-79160","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-formula-1","10":"tag-formula1","11":"tag-helmut-marko","12":"tag-home-page","13":"tag-max-verstappen","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-red-bull","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114460962588275025","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79160\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}