“He was feeling it a bit”: Adrian Newey reveals Max Verstappen succumbing to pressure in 2021 title battle with Lewis Hamilton

Future Aston Martin senior technical manager Adrian Newey recently talked about Max Verstappen feeling pressure during his first championship battle in 2021. He talked about how the closing of the points gap and his Silverstone crash put a bit of pressure on the Dutchman.

The 2021 F1 season was arguably one of the most intense ones in the history of the sport. Red Bull's Max Verstappen and Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton battled with each other down to the very last race in Abu Dhabi, where they were level on points. The final race and the championship were won by the Dutchman, after some controversial decisions taken by the race control during a safety car period.

Speaking to the High Performance podcast in an exclusive recently, Adrian Newey was asked whether Verstappen ever felt serious pressure in recent history. To this, the aero wizard recalled that in the 2021 F1 season, when Verstappen crashed with Hamilton at the British GP, the Dutch driver felt a bit of pressure.

He also mentioned that the pressure on Verstappen started building as the points gap reduced and Mercedes found more pace towards the end of the season.

"I think a little bit perhaps in his championship win in '21 where the intensity, particularly after Silverstone, on-track between Lewis and Max became so intense. I think Max had very strong feelings on that Silverstone accident... So, (he's) gone from easy championship leader to now feeling a bit more pressure and Mercedes managed to find quite a lot more pace out of their car toward the end of the season," Newey said (1:08:44)

"It's always easier for the hunter than the hunted. And Max was starting to I think just feel a little bit of pressure from the hunted. In reality, he's probably lucky to not get a penalty from his driving in Brazil. Saudi, they had a bit of a ding dong. I think that was not clear. So, I think he (was) feeling it a bit," he added.

In the 2021 F1 season, Max Verstappen was ahead of Lewis Hamilton in the championship after most Grand Prix weekends. However, he experienced a dip after the Austrian GP, when Hamilton caught up and briefly took the lead for the title. In the Abu Dhabi GP, both entered the race with 369.5 points each.

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When Max Verstappen revealed which 2021 F1 race he felt pressure apart from Abu Dhabi

Back in 2022, after the infamous 2021 F1 season, Max Verstappen talked about which race apart from the title decider in Abu Dhabi, he felt the most pressure.

Speaking with his personal sponsor, CarNext in 2022, he acknowledged that he felt pressure at the Dutch GP, his home race. The Red Bull star explained how the entire nation expected him to win the race at Zandvoort, which was intense for him. He said (via "RacingNews365"):

“Besides the last Grand Prix [in Abu Dhabi], that was the race where I felt more pressure than other ones. Because everyone expected me to win there, the fans. It was like, ‘Max is coming here, and he’s going to do it, he’s going to win.’ But, of course, we’re in this tense battle, and it was going a bit up and down in terms of performance,” Verstappen said.

Max Verstappen started the race from pole position at the Dutch GP and won it against his title rival Lewis Hamilton, marking his second home race win.