Max Verstappen is the driver who Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel fear will disrupt the duo's current front-running act in F1 says Red Bull's Christian Horner.
Verstappen and Red Bull-Honda aim to become consistent pace-setters this season and therefore genuine candidates for the title.
While the jury is still out as to whether Honda can deliver the power and reliability that Red Bull needs to race at the front on a regular basis, Verstappen is now a known quantity, and one that Horner believes is ready to join the Hamilton-Vettel party.
"Max, if you look at his performance in the second half of the [last] year, was the second highest points scorer to Lewis," Horner told Reuters.
"I don't think he lacks anything that they have, if we can provide him the tools to do the job. I think he's probably the driver that they fear the most."
A five-time Grand Prix winner, and the youngest victor on the grid, Verstappen enters his fifth season of F1 as a seasoned and refined talent, and as a driver who greatly matured in 2018 according to his team boss.
"I think his maturity has increased; we saw that during the course of last year. He's just much more rounded through experience," added Horner.
"He's just more worldly, more experienced. He's just in a better place to be able to deal with the pressures that are placed on him."
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