Red Bull taskmaster discloses what his €500 bet with Christian Horner was

Red Bull's Helmut Marko revealed the €500 bet he had with team principal Christian Horner on Max Verstappen's qualifying position in the F1 Abu Dhabi GP.

Soon after Max Verstappen took his 12th pole position of the season in Abu Dhabi, Christian Horner told him on the team radio that this had won him €500 from Helmut Marko. The latter revealed that this bet was regarding Verstappen's qualifying position in the race.

Horner had confidence that he would qualify in the front row while Marko felt that it would be the second. Marko told Sky Germany:

"It was about €500. Christian said Verstappen would be on the front row. I said: 'No, on the second row."

While Horner is definitely up by €500, the money went to the bar for the mechanics.

"The money will go to the bar, for the mechanics, so they can have a nice evening on Sunday night."

Helmut Marko losing a bet was apparently quite a big deal as the Red Bull driver himself was rather surprised when Horner told him after qualifying:

"Well done mate, you've just won me €500 off Helmut, which is like getting blood out of stone. Fantastic job."

To this, Max Verstappen replied:

"Hah! Helmut lost a bet? What world are we living in?"

Max Verstappen later went on to win the final race of the season at the Yas Marina circuit in a perfect showdown to what was a fabulous season for him and Red Bull.

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Max Verstappen brings the 2023 F1 season to a perfect end for Red Bull

Max Verstappen converted yet another pole to victory at Abu Dhabi and won his 54th F1 race. With this, he surpassed Sebastian Vettel's record of 53 races and became the third driver with the most wins behind Michael Schumacher and Lewis Hamilton.

This season was perfect for the Dutchman with Red Bull. He was the only driver to have finished each of the 23 races. He also became the first driver to race more than 1000 laps in a single season.

Verstappen also achieved the most number of wins in a season (19) and most consecutive wins (10). He finished off the season with 575 points, the maximum that any driver has ever achieved.

Red Bull had a total of 860 points in the 2023 season. Mercedes, who finished second, had only 409, less than half off the top.

This reflects the level of domination that the Austrian team had throughout, winning all of the races in the season except for one (Ferrari's Carlos Sainz took the win in Singapore).

They also had a 1-2 in the driver's world championship for the first time in their history with Sergio Perez in second place. All in all, it was a perfect season for them with the dominating RB19.