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Max Verstappen says he believes Daniel Ricciardo will come to miss what he had at Red Bull, after the Australian decided to switch from Red Bull to Renault for the 2019 season.
After months of assessing his options having conversations with several different teams, including McLaren and Mercedes, the Honey Badger came to the conclusion that Renault was the best fit for him.
Verstappen and Ricciardo have had their differences at Red Bull since they became teammates in 2016, but always managed to resolve them and remain on good terms. Even though they are friends, Verstappen does not believe that he will miss Ricciardo.
"Personally I won’t miss him but he was fun and pleasant to have as a team mate," Verstappen told Algemeen Dagblad.
"That doesn’t happen often and perhaps it won’t happen again. But will I miss him? I believe Daniel will miss what he had here."
Some believe that Ricciardo had concerns about the energy drink manufacturer's switch to Honda power, but Verstappen does not share them.
"Honda’s whole attitude and the plans they have, it’s totally different compared to what we were used to with Renault," said the 21-year-old.
"With Renault we always had to push. It always had to come from us and it was usually ignored. Now it is the other way around and we are pushed to supply parts.
"They need gearboxes and things like that from us, which are really not that easy to make. But Honda just wants to test, test, test. They do more kilometers than I do on the circuit," he added.
"Maybe it will not be enough to compete at every circuit. But we have to make steps during the season so that we can certainly compete for the title from the beginning of 2020."
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C. Sainz jr
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ajpennypacker
Posts: 2,475
I feel like Max is always putting up a front, presenting himself as uncaring and unemotional. He obviously liked Daniel, and he deflected the damn question multiple times during that interview. As if saying "yeah, Daniel was good fun" would harm him in some way. But whatever, I do agree the Ricci... [Read more]