George Russell has claimed Max Verstappen’s outburst at the Hungarian Grand Prix resulted in “25 per cent” of Red Bull engineers courting moves to Formula 1 rivals.
The one-place grid drop Verstappen was handed in Qatar prompted an explosive exchange to ensue between him and Russell in the run-up to the Abu Dhabi weekend.
Verstappen was incensed with Russell’s conduct behind closed doors when the two visited the stewards’ room, expressing that he had “lost respect” towards his rival.
Russell, though, stood his ground and vowed to “put the truth out there” as he alleged Verstappen had threatened to crash into him as revenge for losing pole position.
The Briton asserted Verstappen’s reaction to the ordeal proved that he “can’t handle adversity” and contended a previous case could have led to an exodus at Red Bull.
Red Bull’s dwindling pace witnessed Verstappen launch into an expletive-ridden radio tirade prior to clashing with Lewis Hamilton in the race in Budapest back in July.
Russell has stated that the reigning F1 champion’s outrage at his own team even resulted in an abundance of applications from Red Bull staff being sent to Mercedes.
“I don’t know why this topic has got him so angry,” Russell told media including Motorsport Week. “And like I said to you before, he cannot deal with adversity.
“He’s had the most dominant car in racing history for two and a half years. I’m not questioning his driving abilities one single bit.
“But 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 per cent 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.
“And since Austria, he’s won the same number of races as six other drivers. So when you say, is Max beatable? Of course he’s beatable.
“You know, 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.”
Verstappen insists Red Bull ‘stuck together’
However, Verstappen insisted upon sealing the Drivers’ Championship in Las Vegas that he was proud of how Red Bull worked together to overcome the team’s woes.
“Well, what I know is that the team doesn’t give up,” Verstappen said. “There are a lot of very competent people and I really enjoy working with them.
“I know it’s been tough for them as well. You know, there was a lot of pressure on them this year.
“When you come out of a season like last year, where basically we broke every record and then at one point you start to struggle with the car and you don’t really seem to understand what is going on or what is going wrong. It’s important to remain calm and try to fix it. Every person in the team has their own emotions that you have to deal with.
“So in a way, it’s also people management, because everyone reacts a little bit different to good results or bad results.
“But that’s something that I enjoy as well, because everyone has their own character, but we all have to work together to the same end goal.
“I’m very proud of how everyone stuck together, you know, in those very tough races where we came out a bit lost.
“And then we got back at the factory, there were a lot of analysis going on. And yeah, just the response from that.
“I think when we went to Austin after really understanding our issues from, let’s say, Monza, you see already an upturn in performance and a lot of ideas for next year.”
READ MORE – Max Verstappen labels George Russell a ‘backstabber’ over Qatar penalty row
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