Did Max Verstappen start to 'crack' against Lewis Hamilton? Adrian Newey's verdict

Adrian Newey has revealed that the only time he saw Max Verstappen ‘feel the pressure’ was during his F1 title fight against Lewis Hamilton in 2021.

Verstappen and Hamilton went head-to-head for the 2021 drivers’ championship, which was ultimately settled in controversial circumstances with the Red Bull Driver benefitting from a critical error from race director Michael Masi.

Up until that point, the battle had been an intense affair, with multiple incidents and accidents between the two title contenders.

Reflecting on the titanic battle, Newey conceded that the pressure mounted on Verstappen after his crash with Hamilton at Silverstone.

High Performance podcast host Jake Humphrey asked if Verstappen has ever shown signs of "cracking".

Newey replied: “I think a little bit in his championship-winning ‘21 where the intensity particularly after Silverstone, on-track between Lewis and Max became so intense.

“I think Max had very strong feelings on that Silverstone accident. Of course he’d been the clear championship leader going into Silverstone, then out of the race and was more or less out of the race in Hungary when he got hit by Valtteri [Bottas] - not intentional at all, but still got hit and pretty much hardly scored any points.

“To go from easy championship leaders to now feeling a bit more pressure. Mercedes managed to find quite a lot more pace out of that car towards the end of the season. It’s always easier for the hunter than the hunted and Max was starting to just feel a little bit of pressure from the hunt.”

With Mercedes growing into the ascendancy in the final part of the 2021 campaign, it forced Verstappen to go on the defensive.

In Brazil, he pushed Hamilton off the track multiple times when the Mercedes driver attempted to overtake into Turn 4.

Verstappen escaped a penalty, which Newey admitted was fortunate.

“In reality he was probably lucky not to get a penalty from his driving in Brazil,” Newey added.

“In Saudi Arabia they had a bit of a ding-dong that was a little bit more - I think that was not clear, but Max was probably a bit out of order in Brazil in truth.

“So I think he was feeling it a bit. And indeed Checo [Perez], it’s the usual thing, if the team mate that they’ve been beating suddenly starts to get closer, it’s not that suddenly the team mate’s got better. It was the same with Fernando and Felipe Massa towards the end of 2010, suddenly they get closer because the lead driver is feeling the pressure.”