Ahead of 200th race, Verstappen says he’s ‘passed halfway’ of F1 career

Max Verstappen says his Formula 1 career is “passed halfway for sure” as he prepares for his 200th race at this weekend’s Dutch Grand Prix.

The defending champion made his debut for Toro Rosso in 2015 and is set to make his 200th start on Sunday at Zandvoort. Despite only being 26, Verstappen says he won’t be in F1 for another 200 races, and is unsure if he will be in a position where he will want to sign another contract beyond his current deal that runs until the end of 2028.

“No [to another 200], nice and easy, so we have passed halfway for sure,” Verstappen said. “But it’s already been an incredible ride. I mean, it doesn’t feel like 200, but of course, we’re doing a lot of races now in a year, so you add them quite quickly.

“Of course ’28 is still very far away but in my mind at the moment, I’m not thinking about a new contract. I just want to see how it goes [and] also see the new regulations first, if it’s fun or not. Then even in ’26 or ’27 there is a lot of time to decide what happens.”

Red Bull will have a different look moving forward with sporting director Jonathan Wheatley joining Adrian Newey in leaving after this season, but Verstappen says he has no concerns about the team’s recently announced departures.

“Of course you hear about it even before those things get announced,” he said. “At the end of the day I have a great relationship with Jonathan and it always will be. He’s moving to a different team but it’s a different opportunity for him and also a different role. Sometimes it’s a different challenge. So there are no hard feelings or whatever.

“I’m happy for him that he gets that opportunity. Of course he will be missed at the team but we also have to look at the future and move on from that. We will have to see how we will fill in the roles that Jonathan currently has, but I’m also happy for him. It goes both ways.

“We just focus on the performance. Some people have been leaving, some people have been joining, some get announced, some don’t. That’s life in F1. When you’ve been very successful it’s normal that other teams try to steal people away. It’s not new to F1 anyway. I’m not too worried about it; we just need to stay focused and make sure we have the right people in place.”

Of more immediate concern, Verstappen has taken pole position and won all of the races held at Zandvoort since the Dutch Grand Prix returned in 2021, but admits it will be tough to continue that run at his home race this weekend.

“It looks like there are many more teams involved that can actually win a race, so for sure I’m not coming into the weekend saying, ‘Yeah we’re going to win the race,’” he said. “I just want to have a clean weekend, understand it, learn from it. Of course we analyzed a lot over the break and [will] try to do things a bit different, a little better. We’ll find out over the course of the weekend how that will go.”