Max Verstappen says he would love nothing more than to have better competition his F1 rivals as he understands why people are "getting bored" with Red Bull's unwavering supremacy.
Thanks to Verstappen's 41st career in F1 last weekend in Canada – his sixth victory this season – the Milton Keynes-based outfit upheld its 100 per cent win rate this season.
The team's invincibility is a testimony to the technical excellence it has imposed on its adversaries since last season and the advent of F1's ground effect regulations.
While the championship went down to the wire in 2021, Verstappen and Red Bull enjoyed an early crowning last year – at the Japanese Grand Prix – and all signs point to an even earlier coronation for the pair this season.
The Dutchman also had a tight fight on his hands against Lewis Hamilton two years ago while Charles Leclerc offered a solid resistance in the first part of F1's 2022 campaign.
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But this year, there is no challenging on merit, let alone catching Red Bull's runaway train. Yet Verstappen hopes that his rivals can "get it together" at some point and counter his dominance.
"It’s nice sometimes to have good competition," said Verstappen in Montreal last weekend.
"Honestly, I enjoyed of course ’21 but I also enjoyed the way ’22 went. Of course, in the beginning we had some reliability issues, the car was a bit heavy, but at one point the car was also really quite dominant at the end.”
"I understand of course people get a bit bored if only one team is dominating. We’ve seen it also at Mercedes, we’ve seen it with Ferrari in the past, we’ve seen it with Red Bull in the past.
"So for sure I hope that more teams can get it together, then at least even if you have a little issue or whatever or you can’t get the set-up fully in 100% then there’s another team to win."
As Red Bull continues to run away with the title, there have been calls to tweak the regulations to rein in the bulls' hegemony.
But Verstappen references Mercedes' past domination that spanned many seasons and which also went unchecked, and rightly so according to the Dutchman.
"It’s all about hard work and I appreciated what they were doing," he insisted.
"It was super-impressive at the time, so I never really felt like you had to stop that or anything. It was all about just trying to work harder and try to catch up.”
The 25-year-old says his enduring supremacy hasn't in the least bit eroded his motivation.
"For me there’s probably even more motivation because you know that you have a winning car," he said.
"When you sometimes come to weekends when you are in P5 or whatever is the best – I mean, that’s still very good, but it’s probably less motivating than when you come to a race and you know that you can win."
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