Here's how Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso are 'very similar' drivers, according to Aston Martin engineer

Aston Martin technical director Dan Fallows believes that Max Verstappen and Fernando Alonso share similar driving styles. The Briton feels that the two world champions are quite alike when it comes to finding the limits of their car and extracting the maximum potential of the same by becoming one with it.

Fallows emphasized that the two drivers prefer a car that is consistent and "predictable" to suit their style of driving. Speaking about the plans for Aston Martin's 2023 challenger, as quoted on the team's website, he said:

“I don’t know Fernando very well, so my knowledge of his driving style is based on what others have said. He has a reputation for very much driving by feel – he really likes to feel the limits of the car. If that’s the case, we need to make sure that the platform of the car is predictable, stable, all the things that we try to achieve with a car anyway, but it’s absolutely amplified with someone like Fernando. Max Verstappen is a driver very much like that. He likes to drive a car at, or slightly over, the limit all the time, so you need to make sure the car behaves properly in those conditions – at the absolute limit. My understanding is that Fernando will be very similar.”

He added that both treat F1 cars like go-karts, saying:

“There are drivers, like Fernando and Max, who drive these high-speed, high-downforce Formula One cars like go-karts. It seems absolutely extraordinary to me that they can treat a car as sophisticated and as fast as a Formula One car in the same way as they do a go-kart, but they do. And, if that’s how they drive, it’s up to us to give them a car that they can drive like a go-kart.”

The two drivers share three world championship titles, with Max Verstappen rather close to clinching his second this season, matching Fernando Alonso's record. From the 2023 season onwards, the Spaniard will be moving to Aston Martin, while Verstappen is set to remain with Red Bull until the end of the 2026 season.

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Max Verstappen would not have won from the back of the grid in 2021, says Christian Horner

Over the past five races, Max Verstappen has dominated and made it to the top step of the podium from the back of the grid on several occasions. Red Bull team boss Christian Horner, however, believes that plenty of credit for this goes to the new regulations that have made it a lot easier to follow cars this season.

Speaking on the Beyond the Grid podcast, Horner admitted that the same performances would be unlikely before this year. He said:

“No, I don’t think so. I think the cars were so hard to follow [last year]. The wake from the car was so interrupting to the car that was following that it was very difficult. But then again, the racing we had in 2021, particularly between Max and Lewis [Hamilton], it was just on another dimension, I mean that those two guys were going at it every weekend hammer and tong and it was two titans at the top of their game. It was fantastic to be part of.”

With six races to go, Max Verstappen could mathematically clinch the 2022 title at the upcoming F1 Singapore GP.