The Dutchman has now presided over the pinnacle of motorsport across the past four years. But unlike in 2023 when he dominated Formula 1 by producing a record-breaking campaign, Verstappen no longer enjoyed things all his own way last year as rival teams caught Red Bull.
Signs at the start of 2024 suggested that Verstappen was due to double down on winning 19 of the 22 Grand Prix and four of the six F1 Sprints in 2023 after opening the season with five Grand Prix and two Sprint wins in seven rounds. Yet Red Bull could then no longer dominate.
Between round eight as Verstappen only managed P6 as Red Bull struggled with the kerbs in the Monaco Grand Prix and his P6 in the Mexico City Grand Prix in round 20/24, the 27-year-old only won two races. He secured the victories in rounds nine and 10 in Canada and Spain.
Yet his championship lead, which sat at 48 points after Verstappen held off Norris to win the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, only fell to 47 points through that period.
McLaren driver Norris also overtook Ferrari racer Charles Leclerc to emerge as the Dutchman’s primary title threat.
GPDA chairman Wurz thinks Verstappen got somewhat lucky that no rival could make better use of Red Bull’s diminishing dominance to put more pressure on the reigning champion.
He has also hinted that Verstappen’s luck may run out in 2025 with more teams in the title race.
Wurz told Formule1: “The fact is that there have been many drivers who have mainly taken points from each other.
That may have been partly Verstappen’s luck. On the other hand, he may have forced that by performing to the maximum himself.
“That’s what he has done [in 2024] anyway. He also took a lot of points when things weren’t going well in races and he struck with a win when he had to.
All in all, it promises something for next season.”
Verstappen became increasingly irritated in his dry spell in the middle of last year as Norris, Leclerc, Oscar Piastri, Carlos Sainz, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell won Grand Prix.
The Italian Grand Prix even saw Verstappen tear into Red Bull’s ‘undrivable monster’ at Monza.
Monza marked a key race for Red Bull, though, as the Milton Keynes natives scrapped their upgrades planned for the RB20 after Verstappen realised in his data the root cause of their aerodynamic issues. From that, they recovered and he won two of the final four Grand Prix.
But McLaren pair Norris and Piastri, Ferrari drivers Leclerc and Hamilton plus Mercedes duo Russell and rookie Andrea Kimi Antonelli will hope to prevent Verstappen and Red Bull from building a strong early-season lead again to then punish any performance issues over 2025.
The 2025 season is the last season of the current ground-effect F1 regulations that hindered Hamilton at Mercedes ahead of new chassis and engine rules arriving for 2026, too.
So, a lot of teams will also not be focusing their R&D departments on 2025 but the term that follows.
