Verstappen engineer took mickey out of Horner: 'Didn't want to ruin it'

Christian Horner laughingly recounts a conversation he had with Max Verstappen's race engineer, Gianpiero Lambiase. It concerned a request from the star driver, which Horner almost wanted to go along with.

We go back to the Belgian Grand Prix for a moment. Max Verstappen is proudly in the lead and is asked by engineer Gianpiero Lambiase to slow down. Verstappen suggests pushing harder and getting another fresh set of rubber for the fastest race lap. At that point, Verstappen had no gap to the back for a free pit stop, so the Dutchman would then relinquish the lead, confident of regaining it later.

Christian Horner reveals that for a moment, he wanted to go along with Verstappen's plan, who wanted to put his team on edge: "GP was taking the mickey out of me saying why not, [arguing that] we've done enough this weekend with a sprint race and a one-two finish. We didn't want to ruin that." In hindsight, Horner stands by the decision to turn down Verstappen's request. "Plus, it was a great marker that Max put down on what was supposed to be a gentle out lap."