Verstappen, 27, secured a fourth consecutive World Championship this year in his most hard-fought season since his defeat of Lewis Hamilton in 2021.
Despite winning nine races in total, including four of the first five, the Dutchman suffered a 10-race winless streak between his victories in Spain (June 23) and Brazil (November 3), his longest barren run since the 2020 season.
Having started the season in dominant fashion, the RB20 car trailed off alarmingly as McLaren driver Lando Norris emerged as a threat to Verstappen’s title.
Speaking to media including PlanetF1.com after the Italian Grand Prix, where he finished a distant sixth, Verstappen claimed Red Bull had turned the car “into a monster.”
Red Bull recovered to allow Verstappen to win two of the last four races, taking the title with two rounds to spare in Las Vegas last month.
However, the team were powerless to prevent McLaren from taking the Constructors’ title with Norris’s victory at last weekend’s season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix seeing off the threat of Ferrari.
With Red Bull, McLaren, Ferrari and Mercedes all winning multiple races this season, F1 2025 is widely expected to be the most competitive campaign for some time in what is set to be the final year of the current regulations.
Writing in his column for Italian publication Corriere della Sera, Alesi, who made 201 grand prix starts for the likes of Ferrari, Tyrrell and Benetton between 1989 and 2001, admitted it was fascinating to watch Verstappen under pressure in F1 2024.
He said: “I think we should always take into account what good we receive from sport. In this case, two hard-fought championships at last.
“It was not to be taken for granted to see Verstappen in crisis, threatened in the drivers’ title race, and it was very interesting to see his reaction within a struggling team.
“He offered the best of his talent and this success truly counts as definitive consecration.”
Speaking to media including PlanetF1.com after sealing the title in Vegas, Verstappen revealed that he still regards his record-breaking 2023 season, when he won 19 of a possible 22 races, as his best season.
He said: “Last year I had a dominant car, but I always felt that not everyone appreciated what we achieved as a team, winning 10 in a row.
“Of course, our car was dominant but it wasn’t as dominant, I think, as people thought it was. That’s for sure my best season.
“I will always look back at [that], because even in places where maybe we didn’t have the perfect setup we were still capable, because in the race our car was always quite strong, to win races.
“But I’m also very proud of this season because for most of the season, I would say for 70 per cent of the season, we didn’t have the fastest car, but actually we still extended our lead, so that is definitely something that I’m very proud of.
“You always have to believe in yourself, but at the end of the day it’s a lot of people that have to come together and a lot of things that have to come together with the car, especially in the middle of the season where we had a lot of issues where we didn’t really understand what was going on.
“But then I’m also very happy and I’m proud of how the team reacted, responded and turned it around a bit.
“At one point, it seemed like we were a little bit lost, but at least now it feels like it’s all a bit more normal.
“In general, I do think that since Austin, we have turned it around a little bit and we’re a bit more in that fight again. All credit to the team for that.
“I know that it’s been quite a tough season for us overall, also the constructors, but at least we still won one championship.”
