Max Verstappen jokes about F1’s "jungle" after avoiding an "airplane shunt" at Spa

Verstappen says he saw "a red rocket" appear in his mirrors on the opening lap of the F1 Belgian Grand Prix and that he tried to avoid an “airplane shunt" by holding his line

Red Bull's Formula 1 Belgian Grand Prix weekend turned out slightly better than expected. After all the struggles at Silverstone, team principal Laurent Mekies had anticipated another difficult weekend at what he described as an "energy-starved circuit", but in reality it proved less problematic.

Max Verstappen made a strong start to the weekend on Friday and followed it up on Saturday by qualifying on the front row. The four-time world champion immediately admitted, however, that Isack Hadjar's slipstream had been worth three tenths, and that he otherwise would not have finished second.

On Sunday, Verstappen even briefly took the lead on the run to Eau Rouge, although in hindsight that turned out not to be the best approach.

"Clearly, too much deployment from Turn 1 to Turn 2," Verstappen admitted. "Then I went through Eau Rouge, looked at my battery status and thought, ‘Well, that's going to be a difficult run to Les Combes.'"

On the opening lap at Spa, the race leader is always vulnerable on the Kemmel Straight, but according to Verstappen that was true to an extreme extent this time. He was particularly surprised by the speed at which Charles Leclerc closed in.

"I expected Kimi to come by, and then I looked in my mirror and just saw a red rocket coming," Verstappen said, referring to the Ferrari driver.

"I was like, 'Oh, I'll just hold my line because if I move here, we're going to have an airplane shunt.' So, it was pretty incredible, the [speed] differences."

Verstappen was surprised by the speed Leclerc had on Kemmel Straight and referred to the Ferrari as a "red rocket"

Photo by: Andy Hone/ LAT Images via Getty Images

Toto Wolff acknowledged that almost all Mercedes-powered cars had too little battery energy on the Kemmel Straight, in a weekend during which many drivers complained about other issues with the "self-learning" side of the power units.

Verstappen said none of those issues came as a surprise to him: "Welcome to F1 2026. Sometimes it can be a jungle."

After the chaotic opening phase, the virtual safety car periods fell at unfortunate moments for the Dutchman, who had already made his pitstop. Even so, Verstappen was satisfied with a podium finish at what had been expected to be a challenging weekend.

"I think overall the weekend for us was quite straightforward. The car was straight away in a decent window, so I think that just helps a lot.

"To be honest, today we got a little bit unlucky with the VSC, and I could have potentially fought with Charles, but the second stint was just a little bit worse than I hoped for."

Verstappen said the hard tyres never gave him the same confidence as the mediums.
"I guess the balance was not where I wanted it to be for a long time during that stint, so I lost too much time in the first half of it. But for us to be on the podium here has been a good result."