Crash:
There are several ways you could describe your first season in F1, but 'multi-award winning' seems to be a good place to start…!
Max Verstappen:
It was great and I had some nice awards. Of course I would like to trade them all for a world championship, but it is a good start. I have to say it was a very good start, a very good first season. I enjoyed it a lot, scored good points and gained a lot of experience.
Crash:
Out of the awards, which means more to you than the others?
MV:
I think the personality of the year was nice because people can decide on that one. Also the one that came from the media and the press, that one was nice. And of course the overtaking of the year…
Crash:
You fan club has been out in force throughout testing and they aren't hard to find at every race. How do you feel having developed such a fan base so quickly and from such a young age?
MV:
I always try to be a bit neutral in that. Of course a lot of people are positive, but I just try to improve myself every time I jump in the car. That is also I think what you have to do because everybody keeps improving, so you have to try and improve even more than that.
Crash:
I remember speaking to you in this same unit twelve months ago when there was still a lot of uncertainty of your ability at this level… roll on to now, how different does it feel coming into season two.
MV:
I'm very relaxed and happy. I gained quite a lot of experience from last year; that makes it, I wouldn't say easy, but better to handle because you know what you know more of what to expect. Of course there are some new tracks coming up that will be different to adapt, but in general you know what there is to do.
Crash:
Was there anything coming into that rookie season that you had concerns about that you perhaps wouldn't have wanted to raise in public?
MV:
No, I was not really that worried. I just thought we'd 'wait and see' what happens and that is how I approached the races. Try and do my best like I always do and that approach ended up working out pretty well.
Crash:
If you could go back 12 months, what advice would you impart to yourself
MV:
I wouldn't change so much. It is always easy afterwards to say this and this. But I think at that time, at that moment, I think I was doing quite alright. I mean I didn't have so much experience compared to other drivers. It is always a bit more difficult to start up, especially in Formula 1. But I think I improved a lot during the season.
Crash:
Are you feeling any heightened expectations or pressure that comes with such a high profile first season?
MV:
No, not really. It depends a lot on the package you get, if the car is good, you will do good. I think last year if you put every driver in the Mercedes, for example, they would have won the World Championship – all of them... If you take away Lewis, everybody would have won with that car. It just depends a lot on what you get. We have to wait and see. We have a good car. It feels positive, but we don't know how good it is compared to other teams.
Crash:
Tell me about the STR11 – year-old engine but testing seems to have been positive from a pace and reliability point of view. How far has it progressed?
MV:
Quite a bit. You work on the set-up a lot and it went in the right direction. There is still a lot of work to do, but I think all the teams have that. But in general we can be very happy with the progress we have made, although of course the whole team wants to improve even more and I want that too.
Crash:
How much of the step forward over the STR10 is it?
MV:
It is difficult to say really. It all arrived very late, so we have had less time to test all the bits. Last year we had more test days to really get it optimised. For me it is still tricky to put a number on that. Of course when you look at the lap times we improved quite a bit, but it also depends on the track temperatures and everything and we had a one-step softer compound on. But like I say, we can be happy with the progress, but we want more. I think the whole team wants more.
Crash:
How have you found getting acquainted with the Ferrari engine over the previous Renault unit?
MV:
You have to drive it in a little bit of a different way. But in general it all works smoothly and you can see the reliability is perfect at the moment and we tried to keep it up that way. I think that will be a main key because last year we lost a lot of points just because of reliability and just issues in general. The thing is if you don't score them, the other teams score them and so then the gap is bigger and that is what we will try to maximise early on in the [coming] season.
Crash:
So Ferrari vs Renault in a straight line…?
MV:
You run different wing levels throughout the tests, but I would say it is a step forward. But I think we really have to wait and see in Melbourne how good the step is.
Crash:
Christian Horner has been suggesting as much as a 0.8secs gain with this engine? Is that a fair assessment or is he being pessimistic about his own package?
MV:
I don't know. It seemed to be like that last year. But like I say I am still a bit cautious on the numbers.
Crash:
Franz Tost has said he doesn't expect any Ferrari upgrades this year… how crucial will the first part of the season be for Toro Rosso to capitalise if its development will plateau.
MV:
Definitely crucial, but I think that makes the challenge bigger to improve the car in a better way for the rest of the season. Like I say, we have great reliability for the moment and we try to optimise that during the first few races and hopefully we can score a bit more points than other teams.
Crash:
As a new, young driver coming into F1, did you find it tough to make your voice heard amongst your peers when it comes to decision-making in briefings?
MV:
I think if you show respect on the track to each other and you do clean overtaking moves then they get respect for you. I am mostly from a different generation, so you never grew up with each other, you never raced against them. So they didn't know what I was like and that always takes a bit of time, but at the end it was all fine.
Crash:
Have you found any drivers being dismissive of you and your views?
MV:
I wouldn't say stand-off, but they were just waiting and seeing what I could do, how I was fighting against them.
Crash:
Leading on from that, what is your view of F1 at the moment, in particular its tendency to agonise over new regulations and making final decisions?
MV:
To be honest it is not up to me. I just deal with what they come up with and it is new for everyone, so it is the same for everyone. We just have to wait and see. Maybe it turns out very positive, nobody knows. I am up for new things definitely. I wouldn't say it is bad.
Crash:
Would you like to see drivers given more of a say in how decisions are made?
MV:
I think it would be good to have a few big drivers in there who can have a say because if you had all 22 drivers in there... everybody has different opinions.
Crash:
What would you personally like to see in F1?
MV:
I have never really experienced something different than this. For me it is difficult to say what I want that would be better. I've heard other drivers want faster cars or less degradation on the tyres, but I have never experienced the things they have, so it is difficult to judge what I like more. At the moment it is all about managing stuff, but that is also part of being a good racing driver. It is not only about just doing a fast lap. You also need to use your brains and be clever and I think that is what makes you a complete driver at the end.
Crash:
Turning attentions back to 2016, what are your aims and targets for this 'tricky' second season?
MV:
You always want to do better than last year. But again it depends a lot on the package you get. For me at the moment it is difficult to put any expectation on it. I think after three races I can judge a bit more where we are and what we can do with the car.
Crash:
Franz wants podiums…
MV:
Franz is always a very optimistic person, but I think it is good because it pushes the team forward. But of course I want that too, but we still have to wait and see what we do in the first three races. If we are very close then of course I want to aim for that as well, but at the moment I am a bit more cautious than that.
by Ollie Barstow
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