Max Verstappen Shoots Down Miami GP Upgrade Hype With Just Four Words
Five weeks without a Grand Prix is an eternity in a sport that depends on weekly content, and the broadcasters know it. The standard reentry routine involves a presenter promising viewers that everything has changed, that upgrade packages have rewritten the order, that the FIA ‘s regulation tweaks will produce a fresh grid on Sunday. Max Verstappen , sitting in front of a beIN Sports camera in the Miami paddock with a Red Bull can in hand, declined to play along.
The interviewer started by telling Verstappen the audience hadn’t seen Formula 1 in four or five weeks and that the team was preparing them for something crazy, a shaken-up order, regulation changes. Verstappen, mid-sip, cut him off with a grin. “Don’t lie to them!
” It got a laugh before the Dutchman actually answered the question in full. What Verstappen Actually Thinks Will Happen Asked whether the FIA’s adjustments and team upgrades could meaningfully reshuffle things, the Red Bull driver gave the kind of reply that doesn’t make for a thrilling race promo. “I mean I would hope so, but I’m also not delusional,” he said.
“I hope that we can… I hope we can be a little bit closer. I don’t think we’re gonna massively change in our, in the ranking, but I just want to be closer to the, to the top three teams and basically escape a little bit the, the midfield. That will be nice.
” That is, by some distance, the most honest pre-race assessment any driver has offered this weekend. Verstappen is ninth in the standings heading into Miami and has yet to score a podium in 2026, and Red Bull sit sixth in the constructors’, behind both Haas and Alpine . Why a Big Upgrade Won’t Fix This in One Race Red Bull have brought what looks like their biggest package of the year to Florida .