'Hamilton won't give up, but Verstappen is on a winning streak'

Five races to go and Max Verstappen has a small lead of 12 points over seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton. The Brit would love to win his eighth title, but Verstappen is also ready to fight for his first world championship. This fight, according to Marc Priestley, will go on until the end, as both drivers and teams want to win at all costs.

"He won't give up until it's mathematically impossible. The team wants this as much as ever. Any world title is a big one. He will still want it and maybe more than ever so no way that Lewis Hamilton has thrown his championship away. There is still a long way to go and as we know anything can happen in Formula 1. We just have to wait and see, that's all. That's why this season is so good, we just don't know which way it could go," Priestley said in his weekly F1 LIVE YouTube video.

Preference for final races is clear

Both Verstappen and Hamilton are capable of winning the title, which makes it hard for Priestley to pick a favourite. It is therefore also difficult to predict which team will win which races, but looking at the last five races, he does see that one team is probably in a better position. "You might say this one falls on the side of Red Bull. The one thing I might say about the last three races being in the Middle East is that they are typically hot races and the higher temperatures have often tended to suit Red Bull when it comes to things like track temperature and managing tyres throughout those extreme temperatures."