Defiant Verstappen will ignore driver complaints

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Max Verstappen says he will not change his driving style just because other drivers are complaining about him.

The Red Bull driver came in for criticism from Kimi Raikkonen at the Belgian Grand Prix after robustly defending against the Finn, pushing the Ferrari off track at Les Combes one one occasion and causing him to brake on the Kemmel Straight on another.

With Verstappen set to be the focus of Friday's driver briefing at Monza, the 18-year-old says he will not change just because other drivers say he should.

“Well you have to see it like this: Let’s say you put [Zlatan] Ibrahimovic [Manchester United striker] instead of attacking you put him as a defender, would he like it?" Verstappen said. "Just because other people think he's a better defender, I don’t think he will listen to those guys.

"He likes to attack, he wants to attack. It’s not because other drivers tell me that I have to change my driving style that I’ll change my driving style.”

Asked if he was surprised Raikkonen in particular is being so vocal, Verstappen replied: “Well I was only fighting really with Kimi, that was my race.

"So it’s pretty normal that you have some comments. I mean, I think it would be the same way if I was behind.”

And Verstappen says he will not dwell on what happened at Spa-Francorchamps last weekend, preferring to focus on the next race in Italy.

“To be honest for me Spa is done. I think in general it was a great weekend, I enjoyed it a lot. Especially to see so many fans coming to the track with the orange colours it was amazing to see. So for me what happened in the race can happen sometimes but I just focus ahead to Monza.

“I think it was all pretty clear. Like I said I don’t like to stay in the past what happened there, I just focus ahead and try to push again and just do my thing and show my driving style like it was before.”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.