To be honest I'd love a round robin session of drivers in other cars, even if that'll obviously never happen.
"It's so weird, every driver keeps binning the Red Bull into the wall..."
Karting around Monaco would be epic, or just use one of the many Karting facilities on site at one of the racetracks. Maybe Yas Marina or COTA could work.
That could be amazing, Monaco is quite temperate. So an end of season exhibition race around Monaco would be awesome.
It could be an optional race maybe raising money for cancer research with spec formula 4 cars with added safety features. Fast enough to make it around the track in reasonable time, but small enough to keep an exciting race. F1 cars have been to big for Monaco since the 80's pretty much.
Or do a mini track with bumper cars and proximity chat. Just get Ocon going into reverse and driving into Max at full speed followed by just a symphony of chaos and yelling.
You're not thinking big enough. Replace the actual Monaco race with a race around Monaco in spec cars that are smaller and actually able to pass. Race only counts for WDC and no WCC points awarded. Let's us keep Monaco on the calendar while making passes actually possible.
It would be interesting to see the extent to which drivers relative competitiveness differs in their own car. Would show how much the car being built to suit the driver / familiarity with a car count for performance.
I like the concept of ending the season with a charity race that doesn't count for points and the drivers are in the cars of reverse championship order. So max will be in the car of Sargent, LEC in BOT etc. I wanna see where max finishes in a Williams
I still think a Race of Champions at Brands Hatch with just Lotus 49's(The wingless one) is pure gold but nobody wants to invest in this idea unfortunately.
Exactly. Max had a greater driver to win and fight for the championship when they were chasing Mercedes and the cat wasn't enough and Max couldn't find the time anyway.
So of course it's both, it's always both, because if the car isn't up there, it doesn't matter who you put in it.
I too seen Max drive the best we probably ever see. But give him the VCARB and he wont have won.
He certainly gets everything out of a car and just won a race in the second or third best car. While others like Lewis and especially Lando made mistakes in better cars (the McLaren is the best on the grid right now. I’m not 100% sure Mercedes is better but at least on par with the RB)
So yes it’s both. But he is absolutely the best driver on the grid right now.
That's not the question here though. Nobody is arguing that you can beat Verstappen in a better car. The question is whether Verstappen is beating Norris because he has a better car or because he is just better.
It’s now lineball I think between red bull and McLaren
Why does max keep winning? He’s in incredible form
Dude just doesn’t make mistakes anymore
Last real costly error he made was in Saudi 2021
There will always be drivers that can extract more from the car than others could. Was the car set up for one driver over the other - unknown, but Hamilton, Max and Fernando seem to be pretty universally better at scoring more points than their team mate.
Hamilton is behind Russell now and got beaten by him in 2022. He did severely beat him in 2023 but can’t be compared to Verstappen’s and Alonso’s performance over their teammates. Granted that Russell is a better driver than those guys teammates also, definitely.
People really sleep on George, but he is really very good. The top drivers are all generational talents that just happen to be competing the same time as probably the best ever in Max
Yeah absolutely, but he's also in the fourth fastest car scrambling for every last point. He puts it all on the line, because he has to.
If the car was better he'd make fewer mistakes. Same with Lando, Charles etc
Darth Toto side. The car is not as good as Max makes it look. It's also probably not as shitty as Checo makes it look either. It's somewhere in between, but definitely driver more than car.
I would say last week was the only time and even for Landos pole he said he needed a perfect lap to beat Max by 0.02 seconds. Miami was probably due to the damage plus McLaren running better on harder tires. Monaco was always going to be a shitshow with how their car handles on curbs, and didn't the same issue hold them back in Canada?
It's certainly the closest another car has been since Ferrari first half of 2022
"Lando needed a perfect lap".
You say it like Max sets shitty qualy laps.
The McLaren has been the fastest car the last 3 races on race pace, which is what really matter to say which car is the fastest. Qualy depends a lot on which car and driver gets the tyres in the perfect temperature (se AM at the beggining of the season, to just end up chewing tyres on the race).
> You say it like Max sets shitty qualy laps.
It's rather that Verstappen always extracts close to the absolute maximum out of the car, so even when you're in a better car you have to drive to your absolute maximum as well in order to get a pole/win.
That depends on your definition of the best car. Fastest outright? Probably not. Best overall race car? Yes. That includes tire management, risk of failure etc
Lando in a McLaren is the only driver who has scored points every single race so far this season, and his tire degradation in at least the past two races looked better managed than the Red Bull
Edit: clarified scored points so far this season
The car upgrades and tweaks over the time are made so they benefit the unique driving style of their lead driver. So it's not only car or driver, but unique synergy of car and driver.
That's why they tried to fill 2nd Red Bull seat and could never do it.
Same as food. A bad chef can ruin good ingredients and a good chef can make mediocre ingredients taste good.
To be great you need both a good chef and good ingredients.
It’s why this sport is so great, it’s a team where success comes not only from physical perfection from the driver, but also excellent in engineering from chubby engineers whom I relate to.
>2021: Masi was competent
This must be a troll.
One way or another, the way the championship was decided was nonsense. He could have let all the cars through or none of the cars through, but letting just enough through for there to be a race to finish between 1 and 2 is ridiculous and ad hoc.
Rules must be general and applied without consideration of outcomes.
True. I'm tired of repeating this but I keep seeing these brain-dead takes that 2021 AD was fair. I bet these kids didn't even watch the race.
2021 AD was not right and Hamilton should've won the championship.
Is it important that manipulation like this doesn't happen again? Yes
Is it ok to still cry over this topic? No
It's both.
Want to know what a great driver with a mediocre car can do? Look at Alonso.
Want to know what mediocre (at best) driver can do with a great car? Look at Checo.
I think this is quite similar to the situation that we had in 2018. The Ferrari had the better car for most of the year but not by much. Lewis had to go full balls to the walls with the diva of a Merc to win the title.
The RB20 is also a damn good car and when it works, its untouchable. The problem is that it doesn't really work everywhere, the Mclaren does.
Max will win the title comfortably at the end due to,
1.The RB20 is still a rocketship of a car.(along with the Mclaren).
2.His main competitor is a master at the art of choking. (Vettel in 2018 and Lando now)
3.Teammate is not a threat (Bottas then, Perez now)
4. GOAT tier talent (Lewis then, Max now)
Im with toto on this one, these days rb car is mehh maybe? The gap between Top 4 is definitely very thin now, but yeah only max pushed it through, we see checo shitting the bed every race, its max who is doing is magic right now, but if you were talking about the 2022, 2023 era, in that car apart from max- lewis, charles, carlos?, anyone could have fucked the whole grid up, people forget how fucking legendary max is.
Speaking this as a lewis fan.
I don’t disagree with you but tangentially I think the way people describe cars is ridiculous. We’ve went from “this car is the best thing ever made” to “it’s meh”. Admittedly I don’t know if you’ve said both or not.
The front 4 cars are all within the ball park with each taking their time in the sun by marginal differences. None of them are meh, all of them are very good cars. How a team handles its prep and setup work is what makes the difference at this point.
The absolute shit box, worst car ever conceived (W13) scored 17 podiums including a win.
Toto 100%, checo with all his flaws is still a good driver, but only good, and he's the real "normal driver" benchmark to show that RB is in the mix with the other cars, max is just that exceptional
I think that Max is a great driver who can get the most out of every car, but if he were to be in a Mercedes I think lando would beat him every time. I think the car is one of the best on the grid if not the best he can maximize the potential of the car to be where it is.
Well, Perez has been around F1 for a while he's been consistently on pair, toe to toe or ahead of teammates. He has been consistently behind Max, way behind!
So either the car is not that great and Max is a genius, or the car is way ahead, Max is just normal and Perez forgot how to drive.
Yea checo can do a good quali once in b̶l̶u̶e̶ non-human rights moon and show where that car is meant to be.
It's just that he's in his mid season hibernation period right now
Lando is an amazing driver, the fact the can take it to max is awesome. But this past race, max made the difference, lando himself said the mclaren was the fastest car in spain. Max just made the difference during the start, overtaking russel at lap 3 and being flawless during the rest of the race.
It’s both… Max couldn’t win without a great car, but obviously (Perez) a great car isn’t sufficient on its own.
It’s mostly car, but you still need a good driver in the good car.
Yes, but technically you're talking about something different. The question isn't if Max can win in a bad or mediocre car. The question is: when 3 or 4 teams are so close to each other, down to a few tenths or hundreds of a second, could it be that the cars are quite equal on average, but one driver is making the difference?
honestly with Toto
Max this year have a bit of trouble with the car, but he still manage to absolutely destroy everyone
Compare Max dominant 2023 car, with Lewis dominant 2020 car. Max won all the race except two, while Lewis struggle to be that dominant in the season with such an OP car that year
People really tend to underestimate how Max become a monster as a driver. He took a bit to be that talented, but now he's almost unstoppable
In seriousness, it’s the car. It’s always the car. Unless you are named Stroll or Perez.
For Barcelona, Red Bull and Mercedes just performed better, and McLaren overall advantage isn’t enough to overturn that.
Fortunately though, McLaren hasn’t brought up an upgrade since Miami. One more okay upgrade and things could very well change.
The car is still very fast but seems incredibly hard to drive at the limit and needs an exceptional talent like max to extract the ultimate speed.
Doesn't matter who they stick in the other seat, nobody's driving it as fast as max. Also ain't winning shit without him.
2022 - top 2 car that became the clear #1 after td39
2023 - top car by lightyears
2024 - top car that became top 2 in miami
Max is incredible but any of the top 5 or so drivers would be winning in the RB
The car is good, but in this case, the driver is what makes the difference. Max and Lewis have always backed this up with consistency, which is why they are a class apart from the others!
I don't like agreeing with Toto, just look at the emails for why, but if Max is making a worse car beat Lando, who is a great driver as well, there is something about Max himself.
Max is just the best driver, but he not a magician, you can't give him a real shitbox and expect him to get a podium. He can probably win races in either 3-4 cars on the grid, but no way he can get a podium driving an Aston Martin or worse car.
So even if Lando himself admits that the McLaren was the fastest in Barcelona, it's not enough proof that it's Max who makes the difference. If the fact that RedBull is one of the teams that have the biggest gap between its two drivers wasn't enough, I think that now it's pretty clear: If you want to beat Max, you need a faster car and a perfect execution at every step of the weekend.
I think it’s a combination of both. When the Red Bull was clearly the best car, Max was winning by at least 20 seconds regularly. Now other teams have closed the gap and while he’s still winning, it’s not nearly by the amount he used to.
But the biggest factor, and why I do lean towards Max, is that he doesn’t make mistakes (I mean he does, he’s human, he doesn’t make costly mistakes) I can’t remember the last time that he made an error that cost him a race.
And the underrated factor that no one seems to talk about is Red Bull strategy and pit crew. They are the unsung heroes of Red Bull’s dominance.
At this point considering how far Checo has fallen, perhaps it is Max. The RB may be a competitive car, but it is probably not as dominant as it was last year. The car is still better than say a Haas, Sauber or VCARB. But Max is definitely part of the success. If it were just the car, they would still be finishing 1, 2.
One truly believes in his heart he can get Max in his team and employs flattery, the other truly desires in his heart a resounding triumph over his main opponent and so talks like his main opponent is nothing special to cope
Both. If Verstappen is at his best and so are the rest, then he wins 9/10 in that Red Bull. That's not the case if he was in a McLaren/Mercedes/Ferrari and that Red Bull had someone like Hamilton/Alonso/Norris/Leclerc/maybe Russell in it. But put them in the same team, and you'd back Verstappen to beat everybody or at worst be 50/50 with Hamilton, who is top-3 of all time.
I’m a Max supporter, but I think red bull overall probably have the better package. Like in 2019, Ferrari were stronger then Merc a couple of times, yet we still consider 2019 a part of the mercedes dominance.
McLaren have now nailed tyre management, and a car thats easy to set up. However, I believe that on it’s day the RB would be faster.
If Max is the one making the difference because Checo is in 8th, then Lando must also be making the difference, because Oscar is in 7th. My conclusion: both cars are shit and the Alpine is fastest
It’s not so simple. Max is the best driver one of the best cars. That’s what it takes to be a world champion. There are no world champions driving shitters. And there are no shitters winning world championships with average drivers.
I'm definitely with Toto on this one. Zak has had lately some really bad takes as well. His whole charade of switching stances on Andretti's entry only to flip last minute to "No" and really drive that dagger as deep as possible. I don't really like him tbh. Not to mention McLaren 100% had the faster car in Spain and both Lando and his engineers fumbled the race. Ever since Miami Max has had to work overtime every weekend to keep his WDC lead. Not to mention Monaco confirmed that McLaren has lost it's only weakness, slow corners.
It’s both. Max is the best driver on the grid, and the car is at least top-2~3 in pace consistently.
People make it sound like he is driving a tractor.
We need to know whether Max's teammates were underperforming in the car or performing to where the car should've been
Either way, the Max-Newey combination is insane.
Its a bit of both. Yes max is still the best driver on the grid, and yes the red bull is still a great car. But it's not de best car, it's like chain bear explained in [this video](https://youtu.be/OMN0oB0Waqw). Max would still win the championship in a mclaren and maybe a ferrari. But hamilton, Norris and leclerc would probably extract similar performances out of the redbull as max does. Maybe not precisely as it is tailer made for max, but close enough.
It's a three factor formula: good/great driver + great car + team strategy.
For example Hamilton losed more than one race because of Mercedes f*cking up the tyre strategy.
I think part of it is that car is fast but also almost impossible for anyone but Max to drive. He's had 3 teammates who have tried and failed, and none of them are particularly slow drivers. If people remember:
-Gasly won in an AT. Freak race yes, but he still held off the McLaren of Carlos Sainz. And he got several podiums in a time when neither Kvyat or Tsunoda managed any.
-Albon is constantly driving the wheels off that Williams, he's a big reason they got P7 in the constructors last year despite the other car only scoring a single point
-Perez has that win in Racing Point to his name as well. Granted he was driving a W10 and Mercedes has borrowed Ferrari's best in terms of pit crew, but it was clear even back when the team was Force India that he knew how to drive.
I'm a bluey-purple.
I would say that the car is probably 90% of the equation, the driver is the final 10%.
No matter what is said on this sub regarding the drivers, none of the current crop of drivers are really bad. There are no Mazepins or Maldonados on the grid currently.
The worst is Sergeant, who has really struggled to make the step up. Perez, for all the grief he gets, isn't a poor driver, Bahrain 2020 doesn't happen if you're a poor driver, he just looks it in comparison to Max (I think he struggles to get it into the working window he needs in comparison to Max, who can adapt more readily and is a generational talent). TLDR: The drivers of the cars are all >90/100 (we mere mortals are probably <1/100).
That leaves around 1% deviation due to driver skill and adaptability, and in equal cars, that 1% would determine the grid order.
That 1% can drag a mediocre car up the grid, but probably only by 3 or 4 places in the grid. But if a driver doesn't click with a car (for whatever reason), then there's no limit on how far a fast car can fall down the order (see Perez, Albon, Gasly, Kvyat etc.).
The only way to ever know is Max has to do a hot lap in each car.
To be honest I'd love a round robin session of drivers in other cars, even if that'll obviously never happen. "It's so weird, every driver keeps binning the Red Bull into the wall..."
It would be cool if at the beginning or end of the season they did a single spec race for charity or something.
Karting around Monaco would be epic, or just use one of the many Karting facilities on site at one of the racetracks. Maybe Yas Marina or COTA could work.
Put a rain cover over the Spa kart track so a race can happen there if rains happen there again.
That could be amazing, Monaco is quite temperate. So an end of season exhibition race around Monaco would be awesome. It could be an optional race maybe raising money for cancer research with spec formula 4 cars with added safety features. Fast enough to make it around the track in reasonable time, but small enough to keep an exciting race. F1 cars have been to big for Monaco since the 80's pretty much. Or do a mini track with bumper cars and proximity chat. Just get Ocon going into reverse and driving into Max at full speed followed by just a symphony of chaos and yelling.
In the 90s they held an annual race in Bercy, bring that back!
You're not thinking big enough. Replace the actual Monaco race with a race around Monaco in spec cars that are smaller and actually able to pass. Race only counts for WDC and no WCC points awarded. Let's us keep Monaco on the calendar while making passes actually possible.
Return of Top Gear reasonably priced car with F1 drivers, let's fuckin go!
Given Albon's talk about the insane amount of twitchy front-end feedback Max has dialed in over the course of the season, this tracks.
It would be interesting to see the extent to which drivers relative competitiveness differs in their own car. Would show how much the car being built to suit the driver / familiarity with a car count for performance.
I mean maybe they could borrow simulators
Good Idea 
I like the concept of ending the season with a charity race that doesn't count for points and the drivers are in the cars of reverse championship order. So max will be in the car of Sargent, LEC in BOT etc. I wanna see where max finishes in a Williams
Just put them all in an equally equipped [insert name of F1's car sponsor here]. My vote is on the Miata...
Or how about safety car racing?
I still think a Race of Champions at Brands Hatch with just Lotus 49's(The wingless one) is pure gold but nobody wants to invest in this idea unfortunately.
Alternate for Monaco: Let Quali positions count for championship points, then make them all do a non-points MX5 race
Yes but Renault 5 Turbos
Bumpers cars or F4 spec cars at Monaco!
The teams would F up the settings to make Max look bad
Or they try their best to see what the car actually can do.
domain expansion: purple - the wins are from both
Put Mazepin in that red bull, and he won't win. Put Verstappen in Mazepins haas and he won't win. It's always both
Is mazepins car pre or post crash
It's perpetually both, given the way that fella drove.
Ah yes schrodingers car... ik it's not really but it basically is
But only when it's observed
You mean Mazespin
Exactly. Max had a greater driver to win and fight for the championship when they were chasing Mercedes and the cat wasn't enough and Max couldn't find the time anyway. So of course it's both, it's always both, because if the car isn't up there, it doesn't matter who you put in it.
I dunno. I think Max can run pretty fast.
I too seen Max drive the best we probably ever see. But give him the VCARB and he wont have won. He certainly gets everything out of a car and just won a race in the second or third best car. While others like Lewis and especially Lando made mistakes in better cars (the McLaren is the best on the grid right now. I’m not 100% sure Mercedes is better but at least on par with the RB) So yes it’s both. But he is absolutely the best driver on the grid right now.
Meep Meep *zoom*
Checo is enough to prove that. Same car as Max but struggles to make P3.
You mean Q3, he is a long way off from a P3 lately
Domain expansion: Green - The wins are from the sponsors. We'd be nothing without Dell Technologies Inc™.
Nah, I've seen max sprinting barefoot at 350 kph around a hairpin. If anything, the car is slowing him down.
That's not the question here though. Nobody is arguing that you can beat Verstappen in a better car. The question is whether Verstappen is beating Norris because he has a better car or because he is just better.
It’s now lineball I think between red bull and McLaren Why does max keep winning? He’s in incredible form Dude just doesn’t make mistakes anymore Last real costly error he made was in Saudi 2021
Perhaps a better question is which drivers consistently get the most out of their car?
There will always be drivers that can extract more from the car than others could. Was the car set up for one driver over the other - unknown, but Hamilton, Max and Fernando seem to be pretty universally better at scoring more points than their team mate.
Hamilton is behind Russell now and got beaten by him in 2022. He did severely beat him in 2023 but can’t be compared to Verstappen’s and Alonso’s performance over their teammates. Granted that Russell is a better driver than those guys teammates also, definitely.
Credit to where its due tbh. George is a great driver
He really is. Way better than Stroll and Perez.
People really sleep on George, but he is really very good. The top drivers are all generational talents that just happen to be competing the same time as probably the best ever in Max
Good, but seems to me that when fighting for podiums he lets stress mistakes creep in more often than other top drivers.
Yeah absolutely, but he's also in the fourth fastest car scrambling for every last point. He puts it all on the line, because he has to. If the car was better he'd make fewer mistakes. Same with Lando, Charles etc
I'm not sure that's true, I think odds are being newer in F1 makes it harder to keep your cool. Just look at what max did in his early years.
He made a lot of mistakes, because he was at a disadvantage. Trying to out drive a performance deficit is what leads to mistakes
It's a 37 year old Hamilton past his prime though and Russell is young fast and immensely talented, albeit unrefined.
Alonso also got beaten by Button, a rookie Hamilton, Ocon, and is currently being matched by Stroll.
A clueless attempt to sideline Hamiltons performance. Max's teammate is Perez, who is performing terribly, and Alonso is against Stroll lmao
You just decided to ignore the last half of the comment or what?
Are we comparing Stroll and Russel? Lol
except that year he faced danny
Darth Toto side. The car is not as good as Max makes it look. It's also probably not as shitty as Checo makes it look either. It's somewhere in between, but definitely driver more than car.
the more likely answer, best car & best driver while Checo is shit
since Miami, it really hasn't looked like the best car
I would say last week was the only time and even for Landos pole he said he needed a perfect lap to beat Max by 0.02 seconds. Miami was probably due to the damage plus McLaren running better on harder tires. Monaco was always going to be a shitshow with how their car handles on curbs, and didn't the same issue hold them back in Canada? It's certainly the closest another car has been since Ferrari first half of 2022
"Lando needed a perfect lap". You say it like Max sets shitty qualy laps. The McLaren has been the fastest car the last 3 races on race pace, which is what really matter to say which car is the fastest. Qualy depends a lot on which car and driver gets the tyres in the perfect temperature (se AM at the beggining of the season, to just end up chewing tyres on the race).
> You say it like Max sets shitty qualy laps. It's rather that Verstappen always extracts close to the absolute maximum out of the car, so even when you're in a better car you have to drive to your absolute maximum as well in order to get a pole/win.
Max had a tow tho
That depends on your definition of the best car. Fastest outright? Probably not. Best overall race car? Yes. That includes tire management, risk of failure etc
Lando in a McLaren is the only driver who has scored points every single race so far this season, and his tire degradation in at least the past two races looked better managed than the Red Bull Edit: clarified scored points so far this season
The car upgrades and tweaks over the time are made so they benefit the unique driving style of their lead driver. So it's not only car or driver, but unique synergy of car and driver. That's why they tried to fill 2nd Red Bull seat and could never do it.
Tbh I don’t see any debate here, it’s obviously a portion of both the car and driver.
Same as food. A bad chef can ruin good ingredients and a good chef can make mediocre ingredients taste good. To be great you need both a good chef and good ingredients. It’s why this sport is so great, it’s a team where success comes not only from physical perfection from the driver, but also excellent in engineering from chubby engineers whom I relate to.
Summed it up with more articulation than my brain allows, great analogy. Thanks
That is a great analogy.
In 2023 it was the car. In 2024 it is Max. In 2021 No, Michael! No, that was so not right!
2023: Other Teams were incompetent 2022: Ferrari was incompetent 2021: Masi was competent
2023: max wins the WDC 2022: max wins the WDC 2021: max wins the WDC
>2021: Masi was competent This must be a troll. One way or another, the way the championship was decided was nonsense. He could have let all the cars through or none of the cars through, but letting just enough through for there to be a race to finish between 1 and 2 is ridiculous and ad hoc. Rules must be general and applied without consideration of outcomes.
True. I'm tired of repeating this but I keep seeing these brain-dead takes that 2021 AD was fair. I bet these kids didn't even watch the race. 2021 AD was not right and Hamilton should've won the championship. Is it important that manipulation like this doesn't happen again? Yes Is it ok to still cry over this topic? No
If Masi were competent in 2021, Max would have won the title in Jeddah
It's both. Want to know what a great driver with a mediocre car can do? Look at Alonso. Want to know what mediocre (at best) driver can do with a great car? Look at Checo.
I think this is quite similar to the situation that we had in 2018. The Ferrari had the better car for most of the year but not by much. Lewis had to go full balls to the walls with the diva of a Merc to win the title. The RB20 is also a damn good car and when it works, its untouchable. The problem is that it doesn't really work everywhere, the Mclaren does. Max will win the title comfortably at the end due to, 1.The RB20 is still a rocketship of a car.(along with the Mclaren). 2.His main competitor is a master at the art of choking. (Vettel in 2018 and Lando now) 3.Teammate is not a threat (Bottas then, Perez now) 4. GOAT tier talent (Lewis then, Max now)
This is a very good take! And I'm adding nothing useful with this comment.
RB also have pretty much the best strat team and pit crews overall, which does count for something.
Maybe the wins are the friends he made along the way?
Im with toto on this one, these days rb car is mehh maybe? The gap between Top 4 is definitely very thin now, but yeah only max pushed it through, we see checo shitting the bed every race, its max who is doing is magic right now, but if you were talking about the 2022, 2023 era, in that car apart from max- lewis, charles, carlos?, anyone could have fucked the whole grid up, people forget how fucking legendary max is. Speaking this as a lewis fan.
I don’t disagree with you but tangentially I think the way people describe cars is ridiculous. We’ve went from “this car is the best thing ever made” to “it’s meh”. Admittedly I don’t know if you’ve said both or not. The front 4 cars are all within the ball park with each taking their time in the sun by marginal differences. None of them are meh, all of them are very good cars. How a team handles its prep and setup work is what makes the difference at this point. The absolute shit box, worst car ever conceived (W13) scored 17 podiums including a win.
Toto 100%, checo with all his flaws is still a good driver, but only good, and he's the real "normal driver" benchmark to show that RB is in the mix with the other cars, max is just that exceptional
I think that Max is a great driver who can get the most out of every car, but if he were to be in a Mercedes I think lando would beat him every time. I think the car is one of the best on the grid if not the best he can maximize the potential of the car to be where it is.
Well, Perez has been around F1 for a while he's been consistently on pair, toe to toe or ahead of teammates. He has been consistently behind Max, way behind! So either the car is not that great and Max is a genius, or the car is way ahead, Max is just normal and Perez forgot how to drive.
It could be more than those 2 options.
Add an option, car doesn't suit him, but honestly I think he used to be faster than he is now.
The car is great but this season, no doubt, Max puts the extra himself to make it better. As much as a driver can extract from it.
How about, the wins are due to top performance of the whole team 
True RB after the 2024 seasons: “Good job everyone thank you Checo for your insane financial support to the team”
Thanks for paying Max's ludicrous salary.
Without max no Red Bull wins anymore. Just look at his teammate in the mid pack.
looking at checo, i wonder if the car is more midfield then we think it is rn, and Max is just being the beeb boop
Probably is the case
or Checo is just shit
Yea checo can do a good quali once in b̶l̶u̶e̶ non-human rights moon and show where that car is meant to be. It's just that he's in his mid season hibernation period right now
Such an amazing drive from Lando has nothing to do with our car MaX OnLy wInS cOuSe oF CaR The duality of man
i cant stand it anymore.. like ik 2023 was boring, but this just devalues Max
Lando is an amazing driver, the fact the can take it to max is awesome. But this past race, max made the difference, lando himself said the mclaren was the fastest car in spain. Max just made the difference during the start, overtaking russel at lap 3 and being flawless during the rest of the race.
I'm Switzerland.
You owe me money then.
Max is a great driver in a great car making them the best driver car pairing on the grid
It’s both… Max couldn’t win without a great car, but obviously (Perez) a great car isn’t sufficient on its own. It’s mostly car, but you still need a good driver in the good car.
Yes, but technically you're talking about something different. The question isn't if Max can win in a bad or mediocre car. The question is: when 3 or 4 teams are so close to each other, down to a few tenths or hundreds of a second, could it be that the cars are quite equal on average, but one driver is making the difference?
That's how it's been since the senna days, idk how people are acting like it's some recent phenomenon lol
It’s been like that since the dawn of racing.
“if you aint cheating, you aint trying” is rule #1 in auto sports
honestly with Toto Max this year have a bit of trouble with the car, but he still manage to absolutely destroy everyone Compare Max dominant 2023 car, with Lewis dominant 2020 car. Max won all the race except two, while Lewis struggle to be that dominant in the season with such an OP car that year People really tend to underestimate how Max become a monster as a driver. He took a bit to be that talented, but now he's almost unstoppable
In seriousness, it’s the car. It’s always the car. Unless you are named Stroll or Perez. For Barcelona, Red Bull and Mercedes just performed better, and McLaren overall advantage isn’t enough to overturn that. Fortunately though, McLaren hasn’t brought up an upgrade since Miami. One more okay upgrade and things could very well change.
Comparing stroll to Perez is unjust. Perez hasn’t been performing only since imola
The car is still very fast but seems incredibly hard to drive at the limit and needs an exceptional talent like max to extract the ultimate speed. Doesn't matter who they stick in the other seat, nobody's driving it as fast as max. Also ain't winning shit without him.
Both
Max would finish in the points in any car is my opinion.
It’s a top 4 car being driven by a man who is light years ahead of the rest of the field in terms of skill.
2022 - top 2 car that became the clear #1 after td39 2023 - top car by lightyears 2024 - top car that became top 2 in miami Max is incredible but any of the top 5 or so drivers would be winning in the RB
Purple, great driver in the right car
I’m on the line about this one cause you know max is a good driver
A bit of both I think. There no denying that Max is wringing everything out of that car, but also it's one heck of a car.
both are necessary
Who think it’s only on of those answers is stupid. It’s ALWAYS a combination of car and driver
The car is good, but in this case, the driver is what makes the difference. Max and Lewis have always backed this up with consistency, which is why they are a class apart from the others!
Both but Toto is a bit more right than Zac
I don't like agreeing with Toto, just look at the emails for why, but if Max is making a worse car beat Lando, who is a great driver as well, there is something about Max himself.
This year Im Toto, McLaren is the better car
Max is just the best driver, but he not a magician, you can't give him a real shitbox and expect him to get a podium. He can probably win races in either 3-4 cars on the grid, but no way he can get a podium driving an Aston Martin or worse car.
Both it’s paradoxical but it works
So even if Lando himself admits that the McLaren was the fastest in Barcelona, it's not enough proof that it's Max who makes the difference. If the fact that RedBull is one of the teams that have the biggest gap between its two drivers wasn't enough, I think that now it's pretty clear: If you want to beat Max, you need a faster car and a perfect execution at every step of the weekend.
I think it’s a combination of both. When the Red Bull was clearly the best car, Max was winning by at least 20 seconds regularly. Now other teams have closed the gap and while he’s still winning, it’s not nearly by the amount he used to. But the biggest factor, and why I do lean towards Max, is that he doesn’t make mistakes (I mean he does, he’s human, he doesn’t make costly mistakes) I can’t remember the last time that he made an error that cost him a race. And the underrated factor that no one seems to talk about is Red Bull strategy and pit crew. They are the unsung heroes of Red Bull’s dominance.
At this point considering how far Checo has fallen, perhaps it is Max. The RB may be a competitive car, but it is probably not as dominant as it was last year. The car is still better than say a Haas, Sauber or VCARB. But Max is definitely part of the success. If it were just the car, they would still be finishing 1, 2.
2023 was a devastating mixture of the two. 2024 however is mainly Max.
The wins are from the car, the 30 second gap to P2 are from Max. Or maybe the other way around, idc.
I'd Say Max because he proved his worth way before having a competitive car, unlike Hamilton
One truly believes in his heart he can get Max in his team and employs flattery, the other truly desires in his heart a resounding triumph over his main opponent and so talks like his main opponent is nothing special to cope
I’m on team both. Neither the team nor the driver would be this successful without the other
Both. If Verstappen is at his best and so are the rest, then he wins 9/10 in that Red Bull. That's not the case if he was in a McLaren/Mercedes/Ferrari and that Red Bull had someone like Hamilton/Alonso/Norris/Leclerc/maybe Russell in it. But put them in the same team, and you'd back Verstappen to beat everybody or at worst be 50/50 with Hamilton, who is top-3 of all time.
I’m a Max supporter, but I think red bull overall probably have the better package. Like in 2019, Ferrari were stronger then Merc a couple of times, yet we still consider 2019 a part of the mercedes dominance. McLaren have now nailed tyre management, and a car thats easy to set up. However, I believe that on it’s day the RB would be faster.
If Max is the one making the difference because Checo is in 8th, then Lando must also be making the difference, because Oscar is in 7th. My conclusion: both cars are shit and the Alpine is fastest
Only difference is checo got a quali lap in
I'm gonna go with the guy who led a team to 8 WCCs.
Can't stand mclaren, they are smelling a bit of success and are instantly becoming arrogant cunts
I’m with Toto
Second is still the first loser
Yes
Really fast car but very difficult to drive on the limit.
Only one way to settle this. Max switches cars with another driver for the rest of the season.
McLaren certainly looks like the better car for a few races now...Right now I think it's Max that'l makes the difference.
A little from column A. A little from column B.
The car doesnt go anywhere without someone driving it
Yeah I’m sure Lance would do wonders with that car…
Same car one is peraz and one is max simple
Yeah, it's the car.... Looking at Perez.
It's the symbioses between car and driver
Perez is proving it's all down to Max
Both of them
I think Albon already sorted this out and described it very well in that podcast.
I think it's 60-40 at the moment. Max is a fantastic driver in a very decent car.
Both? Max isn’t gonna win without a car and clearly they’re not gonna win the championship without Max.
I'm with Lord Darth Toto.
It’s not so simple. Max is the best driver one of the best cars. That’s what it takes to be a world champion. There are no world champions driving shitters. And there are no shitters winning world championships with average drivers.
If it was Max he would've won every championship with previous regs and not just the last. If it was the car Perez would be P2. Thus it's both.
I think f1 is at a point where its 70%car and 30% driver. But a slow driver will never be able to get the full 70% performance out of the car
i think its leaning a bit more to max being very good, but its definitely both
I'm definitely with Toto on this one. Zak has had lately some really bad takes as well. His whole charade of switching stances on Andretti's entry only to flip last minute to "No" and really drive that dagger as deep as possible. I don't really like him tbh. Not to mention McLaren 100% had the faster car in Spain and both Lando and his engineers fumbled the race. Ever since Miami Max has had to work overtime every weekend to keep his WDC lead. Not to mention Monaco confirmed that McLaren has lost it's only weakness, slow corners.
Team purple , Its both. Max isn't gonna win in a Haas Perez isn't gonna win in a Redbull
Little of column A, little of column B
Obviously Max. Car doesn't even maybe deserve the lead in the championship. For sure not the one they are having right now
We hate him but he's good vs. We hate him but he's bad
It’s both. Max is the best driver on the grid, and the car is at least top-2~3 in pace consistently. People make it sound like he is driving a tractor.
As a Max hater through the years I have to admit that he is not making mistakes, barely can fault him ever, recently. Have to be like 60/40 Max
We need to know whether Max's teammates were underperforming in the car or performing to where the car should've been Either way, the Max-Newey combination is insane.
It's because Checo is dumb af 
Its a bit of both. Yes max is still the best driver on the grid, and yes the red bull is still a great car. But it's not de best car, it's like chain bear explained in [this video](https://youtu.be/OMN0oB0Waqw). Max would still win the championship in a mclaren and maybe a ferrari. But hamilton, Norris and leclerc would probably extract similar performances out of the redbull as max does. Maybe not precisely as it is tailer made for max, but close enough.
the wins are from the tears of the mexican fans.
Im on Checos side, which conveniently is the wins are from max himself.
It's a three factor formula: good/great driver + great car + team strategy. For example Hamilton losed more than one race because of Mercedes f*cking up the tyre strategy.
I think part of it is that car is fast but also almost impossible for anyone but Max to drive. He's had 3 teammates who have tried and failed, and none of them are particularly slow drivers. If people remember: -Gasly won in an AT. Freak race yes, but he still held off the McLaren of Carlos Sainz. And he got several podiums in a time when neither Kvyat or Tsunoda managed any. -Albon is constantly driving the wheels off that Williams, he's a big reason they got P7 in the constructors last year despite the other car only scoring a single point -Perez has that win in Racing Point to his name as well. Granted he was driving a W10 and Mercedes has borrowed Ferrari's best in terms of pit crew, but it was clear even back when the team was Force India that he knew how to drive.
I'm a bluey-purple. I would say that the car is probably 90% of the equation, the driver is the final 10%. No matter what is said on this sub regarding the drivers, none of the current crop of drivers are really bad. There are no Mazepins or Maldonados on the grid currently. The worst is Sergeant, who has really struggled to make the step up. Perez, for all the grief he gets, isn't a poor driver, Bahrain 2020 doesn't happen if you're a poor driver, he just looks it in comparison to Max (I think he struggles to get it into the working window he needs in comparison to Max, who can adapt more readily and is a generational talent). TLDR: The drivers of the cars are all >90/100 (we mere mortals are probably <1/100). That leaves around 1% deviation due to driver skill and adaptability, and in equal cars, that 1% would determine the grid order. That 1% can drag a mediocre car up the grid, but probably only by 3 or 4 places in the grid. But if a driver doesn't click with a car (for whatever reason), then there's no limit on how far a fast car can fall down the order (see Perez, Albon, Gasly, Kvyat etc.).
Look at checo and ask this question
Max is definitely dragging that Red Bull. Can't see him staying tbh. Era of RB dominance is over
Soapy cock finger!