To win an F1 race, you have to do more than just be the fastest. The team has to come up with a good pit stop strategy, but perhaps even more important is a driver who ensures that this strategy can be executed. That’s why they call Max Verstappen the tire whisperer – he controls the tire wear of his car like no other.
A good example of how controlled the Dutch driver is are the lap times of Verstappen in Mexico. From the moment he came out of the pit lane on lap 26, the driver 38 rounds in a row a time of 1:22 down. The only reason he had to abort his series was the virtual safety car caused by Alonso. Or actually Alonso’s car.
Constant lap times from Verstappen, despite laggards
The two laps behind the virtual safety car slowed the champion down a bit, but then Verstappen drove again until the end of the race with lap times of 1:22. And keep in mind that Verstappen did not only drive in clean air, but also had to overtake stragglers. In addition, the tires get worse per lap, so Verstappen has to adjust his driving style per lap.
If Alonso’s bike hadn’t been so rebellious, Verstappen would have… 45 laps in a row have the same lap times. Of course different figures after the decimal point are still something, but many lap times are still around 1:22,500. Check below the constant lap times of ‘tire whisperer’ Max Verstappen in Mexico.
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