Horner: 'Verstappen doesn't crave adulation, he just loves his racing'

Eight years after Max Verstappen 's Formula 1 debut, Red Bull Racing team boss Christian Horner looks back on how he saw his driver grow from an eager, sometimes too aggressive driver into a (now almost two-time) world champion.

Horner praised Verstappen for keeping both feet on the ground. "He hasn’t changed despite all the adulation he is receiving," the Red Bull team boss began in conversation with The Guardian. "You often see personalities change, they become divas. Max is fundamentally the same lad that turned up six years ago, I don’t think he will ever change. He is at ease with himself. He doesn’t crave adulation, he loves his racing. He is fundamentally just a racer."

At the Japanese Grand Prix, Verstappen has a significant chance of clinching his second championship and thus successfully defending his first world title. The most likely scenario for that is for the Dutchman to win the race and set the fastest lap to his name, or to win the race without a fastest lap, in which case title rival Charles Leclerc may not finish higher than third.

The current situation contrasts with the bitter struggle Verstappen faced in last year's battle with Lewis Hamilton. Regardless, that second title is coming and, according to Fernando Alonso's words, Verstappen can count himself among the sport's all-time greats after that moment.