Verstappen: Newey contract great news for keeping winning team together

Earlier this week, Autosport revealed that chief technical officer at Red Bull Newey had extended his contract with the energy drinks team.

Verstappen, who has won all his races under Newey’s watch, expressed his content over the aero guru's decision - even though he dismissed any suggestion that his own future would be linked to him.

"Nothing will influence anything to ‘28 because I have a contract, but I'm very happy, of course, that Adrian stays," Verstappen said ahead of the Miami Grand Prix.

“But that goes for everyone in the team, right? When you're doing really well, you want to try and keep that whole group together. And that's, of course, also the target for the team for the future.”

Newey’s commitment to Red Bull’s long term future has opened up the prospect of the team continuing to build on its current domination.

PLUS: The generalist qualities that made Newey F1’s pre-eminent design guru

The team’s stranglehold on F1 this season has prompted criticisms about making the series boring - with Mercedes boss Toto Wolff saying F1 needed to look carefully at what can be done to make the racing more exciting.

Verstappen thinks there are different agendas at play, though, because Wolff’s Mercedes team is no longer dominating like it did during the early turbo hybrid era.

"Toto was of course winning back then, you didn't hear him at the time,” Verstappen said.

"When you're doing really well, you want to try and keep that whole group together." Max Verstappen

Photo by: Carl Bingham / Motorsport Images

“In football sometimes you have very boring matches as well and then great matches after that again,” he said. “You can't manipulate everything to create more excitement.

“Sometimes this happens and it’s just part of Formula 1. Sometimes, like in Baku, you expect very crazy things to happen and then nothing happens at all. But the other way around is true as well.

“Sometimes you think 'this is going to be a boring race weekend' and then all of a sudden a lot of crazy things happen. But that's the case in all sports I guess.”

The 2022 regulation changes were meant to improve overtaking and encourage closer competition. After the subsequent raising of floor edges aimed at helping Red Bull’s rivals who were suffering from porpoising, Verstappen thinks the rules are “fine” as they are and isn't overly worried at Red Bull being reeled in.

“Well, you always see that happening a little bit in Formula 1. If a team is dominant, they will try to change things,” he added.

“But at the moment I think it's fine as it as. Certain things are already changed of course for bouncing and so on, but as a team we have always been able to deal with that very well."