Carlos Sainz reveals why ‘everyone’ at Red Bull wanted Max Verstappen to beat him as a rookie

Follow us on Google Discover

Red Bull formed one of the most exciting junior line-ups in their history when they paired Carlos Sainz with Max Verstappen in 2015. Both drivers went on to become Formula 1 superstars.

Verstappen was the youngest driver in F1 history at 2017, catapulted to the highest level of racing straight from European F3. That naturally took some of the attention away from Sainz, who had just won the Formula Renault 3.5 title.

The partnership lasted just over a season, with Red Bull fast-tracking Verstappen to the top team ahead of the 2016 Spanish GP. Daniil Kvyat was demoted back to Toro Rosso.

Sainz never received the call-up, and he left shortly before the end of the 2017 season. His stint at Renault was brief, but he later moved to the iconic McLaren and Ferrari teams.

Carlos Sainz says ‘everyone’ at Red Bull hoped Max Verstappen would fulfil his promise

Reflecting on that partnership with DAZN at the last race in Italy, Sainz said it built his character. Verstappen is one of the most talented drivers ever to step into an F1 car.

But on top of that, Sainz says that ‘everyone at Red Bull’ was ‘supporting’ Verstappen and helping him’ in the hope that he would live up to the hype. That meant, in the first instance, beating his teammate.

Red Bull have arguably struggled to produce drivers of this calibre since, although it’s possible that the mastery of Verstappen has damaged the reputation of the Toro Rosso/AlphaTauri/Racing Bulls graduates.

• READ MORE: Red Bull won’t ‘publicly admit’ main reason for not reuniting Carlos Sainz and Max Verstappen

“In English it’s called character building, which I think is… polishing your character,” Sainz said.

“Those years had to polish my character because I found myself against a Max Verstappen who is, and will be, I think, one of the best in history, if not the best in Formula 1, and my two years as a rookie, well, were with him.

“Being up against a guy with as much quality as Max, with on top of that everyone at Red Bull supporting him and helping him and hoping that Max would be the young promise that so many wanted and rightly thought he would be… well, it really toughened my character and the truth is that I didn’t do badly against him either.”

Carlos Sainz hints he could have beaten Max Verstappen with better ‘luck’

On the face of it, Verstappen comfortably had the better of Sainz. He scored just under 50 points, while the Spaniard didn’t break 20.

However, Sainz says that the poor reliability of the Renault engine distorted the picture. A look at the records shows that he retired from seven races that year, four times due to a loss of power and once due to electronics.

Sainz was the faster of the two in qualifying, edging the head-to-head 10-9, while Verstappen only won the race-day battle 9-8. Nowadays, it’s unheard of for a teammate to put meaningful pressure on the four-time world champion.

“We arrived in Abu Dhabi, the last race of the year, tied, and we both knew we were tied in the standings, so we went all out,” he recalled. “We all like to be at the top of all the statistics; we keep an eye on them all, and this year, at least, I have those statistics.

“In the race, the truth is that I had bad luck with engine failures. The truth is that the reliability of the Toro Rosso cars that year wasn’t the best. But yes, let’s just say it wasn’t bad.”

Red Bull say the atmosphere between Sainz and Verstappen was toxic, but the former disagrees. He maintains their rivalry was ‘relatively healthy’ and thinks they could peacefully co-exist as teammates again.