Max Verstappen makes damning claim about his F1 future as the FIA's inappropriate language penalty raises questions about driver authenticity

Max Verstappen has made a damning claim about his F1 future, as the FIA penalty against him for using inappropriate language has raised questions about driver authenticity. At the start of the F1 race weekend in Singapore, multiple reports claimed that the drivers were told to reign in their language while talking to the media or on team radios. The use of abusive language is something that the FIA president wanted to cut down on.

The first driver who broke this rule was Max Verstappen in the press conference when he made a few comments about his car in Baku. To the surprise of many, this led to a situation where the driver was told to visit the stewards and ended up getting a penalty to do community service for a specified period.

Verstappen did not take this lying down, as the Red Bull driver made it a point to answer questions in monosyllables in the post-qualifying FIA press conference. The driver instead held an impromptu press meeting outside of the FIA conference room, where he addressed the media's questions in detail.

On Sunday, after the race, Verstappen did address the media in the press conference, but when asked if these things put his F1 future in question, the Red Bull driver admitted that such silly things are just taxing and make anyone love the sport a lot less.

There was also the question of driver authenticity getting hampered because the sport doesn't want personalities like Max Verstappen getting censored. Talking to the media, including Sportskeeda, Max said,

"I mean, these kind of things definitely decide my future as well. If you can't be yourself or you have to deal with these kinds of silly things. I'm now at the stage of my career that you don't want to be dealing with this all the time. It's really tiring."

He added,

"Of course it's great to have success and win races, but once you've accomplished all that, winning championships and races, then you want to just have a good time as well. Everyone is pushing to the limit, everyone in this paddock, even at the back of the grid. But if you have to deal with all these kinds of silly things, for me that is not a way of continuing in this sport, that's for sure."

"Racing will go on also without me": Max Verstappen

Max Verstappen was quite pragmatic while discussing the entire situation, as he said he would always be himself and that's how it should be. Once it reaches a point when all of this becomes too much, he would rather leave the sport because the joy is gone with all these things. He said,

"I will always be myself. I will not, because of that, change how I am in my life, anyway, but also how I'm operating here. At the end of the day, I don't know how serious they [the FIA} will take that kind of stuff. But for me of course at one point when it's enough it's enough. And we'll see. Racing will go on, F1 will go on, also without me. It's not a problem - it's also not a problem for me. It's how it is."

The entire inappropriate language saga seems to be getting a little out of hand for the FIA. First, it was the remark 'We're not rappers' that was called out by Lewis Hamilton, and then the Max Verstappen penalty.

For an organization that has been often called out for the lack of efficiency in the manner in which it operates, this is not a good look.