Max Verstappen defying team orders shows he's yet to grow up!

Max Verstappen's defiance of team orders in Brazil and his indignant response to Red Bull on the team radio left many people surprised. The Dutchman openly refused to swap positions with teammate Sergio Perez on the last lap of the race.

Why? According to Verstappen, "I gave my reasons".

This move has left quite a few sections of the fans shocked, especially due to the kind of camaraderie both drivers have shown in the last two years.

Sergio Perez valiantly put up a defensive front against Lewis Hamilton in Abu Dhabi last season, prompting Max Verstappen to call his teammate 'a legend' after the race. This season too has seen moments where both Perez and Verstappen have worked as a team. In light of that, why the Dutchman did what he did is a very interesting question.

To be honest, the answer to why Verstappen did not give the position back to Perez will probably never be revealed. Comments from Dutch journalists Erik Van Haren and Tim Coronel, however, suggest that this disgruntlement dates back to events in Monaco earlier this season.

They claimed Sergio Perez crashed intentionally during qualifying in Monaco, helping him gain the upper hand and win the race. The veracity of these claims is up for debate and unless officially verified, speculating on them is a waste of time.

Returning to Sao Paulo, there is a reason behind the immense outrage over Max Verstappen's actions. One of them has been the rather, for lack of a better word, 'perfect' season that he has put together this year.

He has committed very few on-track mistakes on his way to breaking the record for most wins in a season and sealing the championship. The Dutchman has executed everything so well this season that it almost creates an aura that he can do no wrong.

There are, however, other key aspects off-track that an F1 driver needs to master, and Max Verstappen's actions were a stark reminder that the reigning world champion is still a 25-year-old.

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Our verdict on Max Verstappen's defiance of team orders

Before going ahead, we need to address Max Verstappen's actions at the 2022 F1 Brazilian GP. To be brutally honest, they will go down as one of the most significant moments of "self-sabotage" in the sport's history.

Let's start by giving Verstappen the benefit of the doubt and assuming that Sergio Perez intentionally crashed during qualifying in Monaco. If that is the case, why wait six months to react this way? More importantly, why do it publicly? Why not use your well-earned clout in Red Bull to get it discussed and resolved behind closed doors?

Now, Sergio Perez may not have made a major contribution to Max Verstappen's championship triumphs in the last two years, but he certainly had a role to play. The Mexican defended valiantly against Lewis Hamilton in Istanbul and Abu Dhabi last season, securing crucial points for Verstappen's title battle.

On the surface, the duo have enjoyed a harmonious relationship over the last two seasons. Perez has gone out of his way to help Verstappen this season as well. In 2023, when Mercedes could possibly be a factor in the title battle, Perez could have proven to be the trump card. The way Verstappen has gone about things, however, might have turned his biggest ally on the grid against him. In short, Verstappen could have handled this in a much less radioactive manner.

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How should Max Verstappen have handled things?

The answer to this lies in studying the careers of some of the most accomplished drivers in the history of the sport. Ideally, all Max Verstappen needs to do is take a look at his biggest rival on the grid: Lewis Hamilton. The way Hamilton framed his relationship with Valtteri Bottas is a true example of how a lead driver should behave with the supporting cast within his/her team.

In a championship-winning team, everyone knows who the #1 and #2 drivers are. It is also accepted that for the lead driver to secure better results, the #2 driver might occasionally have to compromise his race a bit.

There are two ways of doing that. The first involves both drivers having a respectful relationship amongst themselves so that the #2 driver is willing to perform his role for the team. The second involves a situation where the #2 driver does so begrudgingly.

In the latter, not many match the description like the Mark Webber-Sebastian Vettel dynamics where the Australian could not have made it more clear that he was not happy to help the German in the title fight.

In the former, Lewis Hamilton could develop a strong bond with Valtteri Bottas during their Mercedes partnership. Fernando Alonso did that with Felipe Massa at Ferrari and before them, if we dig into the past, Ayrton Senna did that with Gerhard Berger at McLaren.

The extent to which Sergio Perez went to defend against Lewis Hamilton in Abu Dhabi and Istanbul last season was admirable. This is something that we never even saw from Bottas. The Mexican played the role of the perfect teammate last season and did all that was possible to help Max Verstappen.

Will Perez do the same for Verstappen if the situation demands it next season? Arguably not. He might not go the extra mile as he did in 2021. There were better ways for Verstappen to resolve whatever Perez did in Monaco instead of publicly flexing his muscles against the team. While it might not hurt Verstappen in the short-term since the championship is already won, the long-term repercussions, however, will exist unless he is somehow able to mend his relationship with Perez in the next race.

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The reality of F1's current world champion

F1 fans and pundits alike have been left shocked and confused by Max Verstappen's actions in Brazil. His actions might come back to bite him in the future. Having said that, though, we might need to sit back and ask ourselves, "Should we have expected anything different from Max Verstappen?"

We tend to compare whatever Verstappen does on the track and off it with the legends of the sport. In doing so, we make the mistake of comparing Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso, and Sebastian Vettel's achievements in the entirety of their careers with that of Verstappen at 25 years of age.

As a driver, the Dutchman's achievements at this age are almost unprecedented. He's the best driver on a grid that has three other multiple world champions with 13 championships amongst them. He has reached a level of maturity in his driving, not seen in drivers of his age.

There's almost this inherent expectation that this maturity transfers into the personality of essentially a 25-year-old driver. That, however, is not the case. Max Verstappen is essentially doing what almost any other 25-year-old would do: making stupid mistakes, being impulsive, and burning bridges he should not.

The three F1 legends on the current grid have put together very impressive careers. However, what were they doing when they were younger?

At that age, Fernando Alonso was blaming Renault for sabotaging his championship campaign in 2006 against Michael Schumacher. In 2007, he fell out with McLaren, the fastest car on the grid, and returned to Renault, a car that was a midfield contender at best.

Lewis Hamilton, on his part, was caught lying to the stewards in 2009 (then a 24-year-old) and had a public fallout with teammate Jenson Button in 2012 (as a 27-year-old) by wrongly accusing him of unfollowing him on social media and sharing the team's confidential telemetry on social media.

Meanwhile, a 23-year-old Sebastian Vettel had a public fallout with teammate Mark Webber after crashing into each other in 2010. Moreover, who could forget his infamous 'Multi-21' fiasco in 2013 as a 26-year-old?

We tend to judge the careers of F1 legends on what they have done in their entirety. Simultaneously, however, it's safe to say that every driver commits foolish acts when younger. Looking back, will either Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton, or Sebastian Vettel be proud of some of the things they did when they were young? Not really. This is the growing up process that every driver goes through in his/her career and Max Verstappen is doing that right now.

Fast forward 5 years, will Verstappen look back at what he did in Brazil and be proud of it? Probably not, but that's just part of growing up. Everyone does dumb things when they are young and irrespective of the fact that Verstappen has made his way into the F1 record books, he's still just a 25-year-old kid that has a lot of growing up left to do.