Max Verstappen says he wouldn’t run his own F1 team like Zak Brown runs McLaren

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Red Bull’s rivalry with McLaren in 2025 was so fascinating partly because the two teams are so different.

The Red Bull team is effectively built around Max Verstappen, with senior acknowledgement openly acknowledging that he’s their number one driver. McLaren, meanwhile, proudly proclaim that they have ‘two number ones’ in Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.

McLaren retained the constructors’ championship easily this year. They wrapped it up with six races to spare in Singapore.

Would you have a number one driver if you were an F1 team boss?

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They would end the year with 14 wins, but these were split evenly between Norris and Piastri. Verstappen single-handedly won eight, which kept him in the title fight until the final race.

Max Verstappen believes in having a number one driver

Verstappen very nearly snatched the crown away from Norris, ultimately finishing just two points back. This appears to have strengthened his view that an F1 team should have a number one driver.

Red Bull have favoured Verstappen since Daniel Ricciardo’s departure at the end of 2018. Ricciardo felt the team were gravitating towards the Dutchman even before he left.

Zak Brown and Andrea Stella have instilled a culture at McLaren where both drivers have an equal shot at winning the title, and they too will feel vindicated by their ultimate triumph.

🔢 Rank Max Verstappen’s five teammates since Daniel Ricciardo

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Verstappen told Viaplay: “If I were to be a team principal, I’d put a clear number one driver and a number two driver, but one that’s good enough to score points to fight for the constructors’ championship.”

Red Bull finished third in the constructors’ this year, 382 points behind McLaren. Yuki Tsunoda, who replaced Liam Lawson after two races, finished 17th in the championship.

They said McLaren were crazy, they were wrong

Brown says it’s McLaren’s ‘DNA’ to have two equal drivers. This is the first time they have had to manage an intra-team title fight since 2007.

Back then, the rivalry between Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso arguably became self-destructive, allowing Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen to steal the title.

Jacques Villeneuve says McLaren should have let Alonso win the title that year, when Hamilton was still a rookie.

The team were wary that Verstappen could play the Raikkonen role this year. In Brown’s words, critics thought McLaren were ‘crazy’ for sticking to their principles, but they held on in a nerve-wracking finale.