The travails of Verstappen’s would-be Dutch F1 superstar predecessors 

The Dutch flags, emblazoned with the name of the country’s motorsport hero, flew as the crowd’s favourite sped to victory around Zandvoort. There were an estimated 60,000-plus of them, putting the attendance of many grands prix to shame. But this wasn’t a GP. It wasn’t even Formula 1. It was the 1993 Marlboro Masters of Formula 3. And the flags proclaimed ‘Jos The Boss’ in honour of the young Verstappen who, they were sure, was about to take the
 world of F1 by storm.

The Netherlands and Zandvoort had lost their Grand Prix after the 1985 race, yet still the country retained a motorsport culture and was crying out for an F1 star.

“We never had a talent that big in our country,” reflects Frits van Amersfoort, whose first visit to a racetrack was for the 1967 Dutch GP, got into the sport by running the Formula Ford car of Huub Rothengatter, and had overseen Verstappen – who was managed by Rothengatter, by now an ex-F1 Spirit, Osella and Zakspeed battler – to the 1992 Benelux Opel Lotus title.

“Of course we had F1 drivers in the past – the most known one was Jan Lammers, and we also had Huub. But they were hardly successful, and all of a sudden we had Jos who was highly successful in F3, helped by an immense campaign organised by Huub. As Jos came from the southern province of Limburg, he already had the whole province behind him and that made him very popular.”

Verstappen made it to the F1 grid in 1994, but it was in a Benetton team alongside Michael Schumacher.

“Jos was pretty good but he ran against Michael, and he just had the 3, 4, 5% more ability than Jos,” points out John ‘Hans’ Hugenholtz Jr, a racer who has been a prime advocate of helping young Dutch talent, and whose father was managing director of the Zandvoort track from 1949-73, and designed circuits at Suzuka, Jarama and Zolder.

Hugenholtz Sr is also immortalised in the naming of the banked left-hand hairpin behind the Zandvoort paddock, Hugenholtzbocht: “The circuit at the time was owned by the local town and they always ran short of budget, so they couldn’t give my father a proper present but they gave him a corner – much better than getting a gold watch or a silver pen or whatever!”

Verstappen Sr made it to the F1 grid in 1994 with Benetton alongside Michael Schumacher but only managed one podium

Photo by: Sutton Images

Verstappen and others of his generation – including the late Marcel Albers, killed at Thruxton in an F3 crash in 1992, and Tom Coronel, who got so close to entering F1 with Arrows in 2000 – were beneficiaries of sponsorship from Marlboro, which carried them into drives at Van Amersfoort Racing.

“When I took the benefit of the Marlboro backing there was no GP anymore, so there was lots of finance available to be invested in other series,” explains van Amersfoort. “Everybody meaning something in Dutch motorsport would know where to find Marlboro’s Amstelveen headquarters.

“That’s also maybe the reason why the Masters of F3 took such a step because Marlboro was the biggest sponsor ever. And one reason is that it was free admission – we Dutch are renowned for not wanting to spend a lot of money!”

When the ban on tobacco advertising hit, it proved a hammer blow for aspiring Dutch racers.

"I think of the drivers pre-Jos Verstappen, Jan was the best. Jan could have got further if he’d got in the right team at the right moment, absolutely" John  Hugenholtz Jr

“After Marlboro left – because they had to! – nearly the whole of motorsport in Holland died because of that,” says van Amersfoort, whose VAR team went on to run Max Verstappen in F3 in 2014, his first season in cars. “The basic problem for Dutch drivers without family funding is finance.

“For Max and the Verstappen family, it’s so easy to find sponsorship now but, in the beginning, after Max and Jos agreed to start with us, we couldn’t find anybody to finance the car. That’s also Dutch – now they’re all ready to jump on a rolling train and take the benefit from it. But in the beginning, when it’s still all unsecure and uncertain, they won’t do it.”

The Dutch federation – the KNAF – attempted to plug the gap by introducing its Talent First scheme, with van Amersfoort’s right-hand man and commercial boss Rob Niessink as a prime mover.

“The winner got a free season of Formula Ford with us, and it ended with a free season for Giedo van der Garde in Formula Renault,” explains van Amersfoort. “But the federation needed the board to approve everything and the investment, and they were never able to find a
big sponsor for that.”

Van der Garde benefitted from Talent First scheme to get onto the Formula Renault ladder, but Dutch motorsport suffered when tobacco money withdrew

Photo by: Andrew Ferraro / Motorsport Images

Talent First still exists but doesn’t offer any significant funding, and this proved a frustration to Hugenholtz, who joined the KNAF and attempted to launch a Dutch Formula 4 series in the mid-2010s.

“The reason I left KNAF was because they didn’t really understand what it takes to help young drivers,” he says. “They said, ‘We cannot just give money’, but it’s very simple – if you want to support young drivers, what you’ve got to do is provide testing facilities, maybe pay for tyres, maybe pay for a team to provide a car, stuff like that.”

In the meantime, Dutch drivers van der Garde, Christijan Albers (another to enjoy Marlboro support with VAR, but who got sidetracked into the DTM with Mercedes before belatedly entering F1) and Robert Doornbos made it to the F1 grid but never got properly established. Robin Frijns – also from Limburg – blazed a Verstappen-style supernova through the junior categories, tested for Red Bull and Sauber and took part in FP1 sessions for Caterham, yet somehow the door remained shut. And then, more recently, there’s the curious case of Nyck de Vries.

PLUS: The lost F1 drivers who only got one shot at glory

Van Amersfoort believes there’s an element of the Dutch psyche whereby sporting success should be guaranteed, and it’s difficult to get to grips with the concept of taking a step back before two forward.

“When the Dutch national football team starts the World Cup, we always think we will win it – and we never did,” he laughs.
“That’s Dutch. They feel that they want
 to be the best from the beginning.”

It’s been tough, therefore, for Dutch drivers to establish themselves in F1. The first regular was the popular nobleman Carel de Beaufort, who raced privateer Porsches in patriotic orange under the Ecurie Maarsbergen banner before he was killed, aged 30, in the 1964 German GP.

Roelof Wunderink, Boy Hayje and Michael Bleekemolen crept into the field in the 1970s, after Le Mans 24 Hours winner Gijs van Lennep had carved out his own small niche in F1 history by, at the 1973 Dutch GP, becoming the first driver to score a point in a car constructed by Frank Williams. But it was Jan Lammers, as the reigning European Formula 3 champion, who gave real hope when he raised enough sponsorship to compete with Shadow in 1979.

“Even in those days for Jan, it was a matter of finance,” says Hugenholtz, who has worked with Lammers in sportscar racing. “Jan was very good – he had some astonishing results in mediocre cars, the ATS and some of the others.

With better finances, that would have opened the door to better teams, future sportscar ace Lammers could well have shone in F1

Photo by: David Phipps

“I think of the drivers pre-Jos Verstappen, Jan was the best. He was better than Gijs van Lennep, but Gijs was an endurance racer, not an F1 racer. So I think Jan could have got further if he’d got in the right team at the right moment, absolutely.”

Archive: Lammers' forgotten F1 comeback

Between the Verstappens, there was Coronel, who as champion of Japan’s flagship Formula Nippon series in 1999 arguably deserved a shot at F1. More recently, he’s a regular on the world touring car scene and the Dakar Rally and has presented a Dutch version of Top Gear with twin brother Tim, another ex-Marlboro/VAR hopeful.

“Tom is a great driver, he was my co-driver at Le Mans and other events, but I don’t think he would have made it to the top in Formula 1,” Hugenholtz reckons. “If you look at it, the 30 who are racing or testing in F1 are the best in the world, apart from maybe looking at America. The chance of getting in there is really slim, or you’ve got to have a lot of money, but that doesn’t mean you’re a good driver!”

"Dutch people want to join somebody who is winning, and not someone who is having a difficult time. So now that Max is on a high, we tend to forget that we also have a national football team" Frits van Amersfoort

So what shape is the country in for a post-Max Verstappen future in F1? Richard Verschoor is an F2 race winner with VAR, ditto Kas Haverkort two steps down in Formula Regional. Hugenholtz is realistic, but only in the sense that there is likely no nation producing a driver good enough to operate at Verstappen’s level, to galvanise a whole population behind him.

“Sergio Perez is a great driver – he just happened to run into Max,” he points out. “If you look at Max his ability is at such a high level even worldwide there are very few people who can challenge him.”

This is to such an extent that the pressure could be off the Netherlands’ football team for the 2024 Euros and 2026 World Cup.

“Dutch people want to join somebody who is winning, and not someone who is having a difficult time,” says van Amersfoort. “So now that Max is on a high, we tend to forget that we also have a national football team because Max is now the man! That’s the truth – they all want to go with a champion.”

Verstappen's enduring success has proved a huge draw to Dutch crowds

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images