The three-time world champion told reporters at a news conference ahead of this weekend’s Austrian Grand Prix, a home event for Red Bull, that he was focused on work for next year’s car and driving for the team.

His response to a direct question will end, for now at least, speculation that he had lost faith in Red Bull following a stormy passage earlier this year when team boss Christian Horner was accused of controlling behaviour by a female colleague.

“Ok, yes,” he said when asked if he was staying. “And that’s what I have already said. We are working on next year’s car and when you are focused on that it means that you’re also driving for the team.

“Of course, people are talking, but it’s most important that we have a very competitive car for the future. It is very tight on track, but we are working as a team to try and improve. We want to be competitive again next year.”

Mercedes team chief Toto Wolff had said Verstappen was his primary target to replace departing seven-time world champion Hamilton.

“I have a long contract with the team,” added Verstappen.

“I’m very happy where I’m at and we’re already focusing on next year with things we can implement on the car. So, I guess that should say enough of where I’m driving next year.”

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Max Verstappen has a contract with Red Bull until 2028.

His father Jos, attending only his second race this year after declaring in Bahrain that Red Bull would “explode” if Horner was retained, appeared to support the decision to stay and fight for more glory with Red Bull.

After seven wins from 10 races this year, Verstappen has a 69-point lead in the title race ahead of nearest rival and friend Lando Norris of McLaren, who has closed the gap on track and believes he can beat him and his two-year dominance of the sport.

Mercedes and Ferrari have also shown competitive potential to win with George Russell taking pole in Canada and Hamilton his first podium finish this season in last Sunday’s Spanish race.

“It’s great that there isn’t just one dominant force out there now because people want to see fights on track and the drivers going for it,” said Russell.

“There should be more than one car in a position to win. It’s really exciting now to see how this season pans out and into next year – there could be four or five teams fighting to win.”

If Mercedes switch their attention away from Max Verstappen, it is expected they will sign Italian teenager Kimi Antonelli, who will turn 18 in August.

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There has been speculation the triple world champion could move to Mercedes to replace Ferrari-bound Lewis Hamilton next year after Red Bull team principal Christian Horner was accused of inappropriate conduct towards a woman colleague.

Horner was cleared of any wrongdoing ahead of the season-opener in Bahrain but the off-track scandal rumbled on for weeks.

The Dutchman Verstappen is signed with Red Bull until 2028 but suggested earlier in the season that he would consider leaving if the team parted company with long-time mentor Helmut Marko.

Max Verstappen’s father Jos has claimed that Red Bull faced being “torn apart” if Horner remained in position.

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However, the paddock chatter in Shanghai this week has been firmly back on racing, something that pleased Verstappen.

“After 2021 I signed a long deal with the team. The only thing I said from the beginning was that I wanted to have a quiet, peaceful environment,” Verstappen told reporters.

“Lately we have been talking about the car, so I am very happy about that already.

“That’s also how it should be. And of course as long as I am happy with the team, there has never been a reason to leave.”

Max Verstappen is chasing a fourth victory in five races in 2024 but admitted the weekend’s Chinese Grand Prix will be an unknown quantity.

The Formula One circus is back at the Shanghai International Circuit for the first time in five years with a sprint race on Saturday.

“With the new cars of course there will be a little bit of the unknown,” said Verstappen. “Of course it is the same for everyone.”

There is only one practice session on Friday before sprint qualifying, so Verstappen said it was important for the team to get the set-up nailed early.

“We need to have a good FP1 where we don’t have to fine-tune too much on the car. That will really help,” he said.

“Time will tell, I’m not too worried about it.”

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The win — Red Bull’s fifth from five races this season — extends Verstappen’s lead at the top of the standings to 14 points and follows his triumph in the inaugural Miami race last year.

The 1-2 for Red Bull is their fourth in five races so far this year as the team utterly dominate the sport leaving their rivals to battle for the third podium position.

Aston Martin’s Spanish veteran Fernando Alonso took third for his fourth podium in five races this season as he continues to enjoy his late career revival.

Verstappen had to work hard for his third victory of the campaign after his disappointing performance in Saturday’s qualifying left him in the middle of the grid.

But the speed of the Red Bull car, combined with smart decisions on tyres, meant that the Dutchman was able to quickly get himself in contention and then produce a late surge to beat his team-mate Perez, who remains second in the standings.

Perez, starting on pole, made the perfect start, racing clear of his rivals but Verstappen, on hard tyres, quickly moved through the field and took just 15 laps to reach second place behind his team-mate.

– ‘Very satisfying’ –

Perez pitted on lap 20 allowing Verstappen to take the lead but the Dutchman had to give that up when he went into the pits on lap 46, changing to the medium compound tyres and coming out 1.2 seconds behind.

It took just two laps for Verstappen, who won the inaugural Miami Grand Prix a year ago, to take advantage of his fresher tyres with better grip as, after a brief joust, he overtook the Mexican, on 25-lap-old tyres, to take the lead.

Verstappen’s 38th win for Red Bull equals the team record set by Sebastian Vettel and is the first time a driver has won from exactly ninth on the grid since Niki Lauda at the French Grand Prix in 1984.

“I took the cars off one by one and then I could stay out really long on the hard tyres and that’s where we I think made the difference,” said Verstappen.

“For sure winning a race from P9 is always very satisfying,” he said.

It was a disappointing day for Perez, who after his victory in Baku last week, had a great chance to win from pole but was left frustrated with the tyre choice.

“I think the medium initially was really poor. It wasn’t expected and that really compromised our pace,” said Perez.

“Then, in all honesty, I think Max had tremendous pace on that hard tyre and I have got to analyse what happened today because we simply didn’t have the pace,” he added.

Mercedes had some consolation at the end of a difficult week with George Russell taking fourth place ahead of Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz and team-mate Lewis Hamilton finishing sixth.

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff had described the car as a “nasty piece of work” after qualifying but Russell was delighted with his fourth.

“I am feeling pumped to be honest because it has been a while since we had a good race like that where we made overtakes stick,” he said.

“I would have liked to have been three positions higher but we know the position we are as a team right now and P4 was the maximum today,” he added.

Charles Leclerc, who crashed late in qualifying and started seventh on the grid, finished in seventh place on another disappointing day for Ferrari.

“There’s really a lot of work to do,” said Leclerc, “We have a car that has a good feeling under ideal conditions, but as soon as you get away a bit it gets complicated. We need a more consistent car especially in the race.

“It’s a very difficult situation because you can fight in qualifying, but then in the race you have to accept that you are passed.”

The Alpine pair of French drivers Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocan finished eighth and ninth with Dane Kevin Magnussen finishing tenth.

It was a tough debut in his homeland for American rookie Logan Sargeant of Williams who had to pit early after losing his front wing and ended last.

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Ferrari’s pole-sitter Charles Leclerc completed the podium, a respectable third.

“Vamos!” exclaimed the Mexican on the team radio after making it a hugely profitable weekend in Baku where he also claimed Saturday’s sprint race.

Red Bull boss Christian Horner acknowledged Perez’s “sensational weekend”.

He added: “He’s always been outstanding on this track, I don’t know what it is about Azerbaijan, but he absolutely excels here.”

Red Bull’s roll through 2023 after four races now reads four wins plus Saturday’s sprint, three poles, and three 1-2s.

Verstappen leads the drivers’ championship by just six points ahead of the fifth round of the record 23-race season in Miami.

Perez’ engineer told him on the team radio he was the “king of the streets” and with justification as five of his six F1 wins – not counting Saturday’s sprint – have come on street circuits, twice in Baku alongside victories in Saudi Arabia, Monaco and Singapore.

The popular Perez, who believes he can really challenge Verstappen for the title, said: “It really worked out today for us (me), we managed to keep the pressure on Max. I think it was very close between us, we pushed to the maximum, we both hit the wall a few times but we (I) managed to keep him under control.”

Leclerc conceded that for the time being at any rate Red Bull were in “another league once it comes to the race”.

“Over 51 laps it was not possible, they have so much more pace than we do. Everyone is working flat out to understand what we can do in the races to close the gap.”

Safety car

The warmest day of a frenetic sprint weekend had the drivers arriving onto the grid, umbrellas perched on their cars.

After a resounding rendition of the national anthem the covers came off the tyres and the lights went out with pole-sitter Leclerc holding off Verstappen to the 90 degree turn one.

The Dutch ace had the Ferrari in his cross hairs though, waiting to pounce.

The inevitable happened on lap four as the Red Bull star nipped past, leaving Leclerc sandwiching the Red Bulls.

Perez inched closer to the slower red rival and duly coasted past on lap six.

Verstappen pitted on lap 10 leaving Perez in control but then the safety car intervened to clear Nyck De Vries’s stricken Alpha Tauri after hitting a wall.

All the leaders used the safety interlude to take a free pit stop with racing resuming under a safety car restart on lap 13.

Perez managed that slickly as Verstappen got the better of Leclerc to leave the Red Bulls in front.

At the midway point Perez led from Verstappen with Leclerc a forlorn 13sec behind, and that’s as it ended up in a race that will not figure on most fans top five of the season.

Fernando Alonso only narrowly missed out on a fourth consecutive podium, the 41-year-old Spaniard finishing fourth in the Aston Martin ahead of Carlos Sainz in the other Ferrari.

Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton was in sixth ahead of Lance Stroll in the second Aston Martin.

George Russell, who secured the point for the fastest lap, was ninth for Mercedes with Yuki Tsunoda’s Alpha Tauri rounding out the top 10.

Verstappen was relaxed at his teammate taking the limelight.

“We know it’s a very long season, you keep learning – it can never be perfect all the time.”

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The world champion began from pole and despite being passed by Mercedes pair George Russell and Hamilton at the start, he kept his cool to win a race red flagged three times, with multiple crashes.

Hamilton came home second ahead of Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, who made it three podiums from three this year.

“We had a very poor start, lap one I was careful as I had a lot to lose,” said Dutchman Verstappen, who won the season-opening race in Bahrain and came second in Jeddah a fortnight ago.

“After that, the pace of the car was quick. With these red flags, I don’t know, I don’t really understand. It was a bit of a mess but we had good pace and we won, so that’s important.

It was a disastrous day for Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, last year’s winner, who spun out on the first lap, while Russell’s car caught fire on lap 19 and his race too was over.

Victory was Verstappen’s maiden win in Melbourne and Red Bull’s first in Australia since Sebastian Vettel’s 2011 triumph.

His teammate and winner in Saudi Arabia Sergio Perez sliced through the field to come fifth after qualifying last due to brake issues, behind Lance Stroll in the other Aston Martin.

– Late drama –

The Red Bull triumph came despite unbelievable late drama that saw a red flag come out when Verstappen had a comfortable lead from Hamilton and Alonso with two laps left, meaning they had a bunched restart for an all-out attack to the finish.

But it descended into chaos when Alonso was clipped by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz as they jostled for position and sent into a spin, which caused a flow on effect with multiple other cars coming to grief.

Sainz was given a five-second penalty, eventually finishing 12th, and the race stopped again.

It resumed after a lengthy delay for single lap behind a safety car — with no overtaking allowed  — in the order of the previous start with only 12 cars left.

“I didn’t expect to be second so I’m super grateful for it,” said seven-time world champion Hamilton.

“I’m driving as best I can and working as hard as I can but still, considering we’ve been down on performance and in straight pace, for us to be up there fighting with Aston is amazing.”

On a fine day, Lando Norris in a McLaren was sixth, Niko Hulkenberg in the Haas seventh and rookie Oscar Piastri, in the other McLaren, an encouraging eighth on his home circuit.

– ‘Rollercoaster of emotions’ –

Alpha Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu came ninth and AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda 10th.

“We had a rollercoaster of emotions today, many things going on at the beginning, and the last half an hour,” said Spanish veteran Alonso.

“Mercedes were very fast and Lewis did an incredible job — I could not match the pace, but we’ll take P3.”

With Red Bull’s undeniable speed advantage, it was crucial for Russell and Hamilton to get a strong start.

And they did just that with both scorching past a tentative Verstappen on the first corner before Leclerc spun at Turn 3 and the safety car came out.

They resumed with Hamilton pressing Russell before the safety car was deployed again on lap seven when Williams’ Alexander Albon lost control, leaving gravel on the track, with a red flag eventually needed.

They got underway again from a standing start with Hamilton initially keeping Verstappen at bay.

But it only a matter of time before the Dutchman made his move and he surged into the lead on lap 12.

Once more a safety car was needed when Russell’s car broke down, but Verstappen was in charge now and pulling clear.

By the halfway mark, he was seven seconds ahead with the battle seemingly all about who came second between Hamilton and Alonso.

But there was more drama when Kevin Magnussen lost the rear tyre of his Haas and the red flag came out again at the death.

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The 25-year-old dominated from the pole and with a sublime performance took his record-extending 15th win of 2022.

Leclerc pips Perez to P2 in the drivers' championship

Vettel scores points in his 299th and final F1 race #AbuDhabiGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/yvPjtOnTus

— Formula 1 (@F1) November 20, 2022

With the closing race of the season, Red Bull extended their lead to 759 points way ahead of Ferrari’s 529, who finished second in this year’s championship.

P2 and P4 for Leclerc and Sainz seals second place for @ScuderiaFerrari #AbuDhabiGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/MLvw3KgYS8

— Formula 1 (@F1) November 20, 2022

Leclerc, who was in contention for the title earlier this year before Ferrari’s season collapsed under a barrage of mistakes and reliability issues, beat Perez on divergent tactics to finish in second on Sunday.

Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettels ended his glittering career with a point. Although, the four-time champion wanted to achieve more on his final race before a one-stop strategy forced him behind his team-mate Lance Stroll and Alpine’s Esteban Ocon.

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz rounded out the podium after he engaged in a tense race with seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton, who struggled with his Mercedes for much of the race and retired in the closing laps with a hydraulic issue.

The Briton ended the season for the first time without a win while his team-mate George Russell finished in fifth only after having to serve a five-second penalty for an unsafe release in the pits.

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The triumph also marked Mercedes’ first GP win in 2022 after a disappointing season with seven-time world champion Hamilton coming in second in a closely contested race to make it an impressive 1-2 for the team.

The 24-year-old Briton started third on the grid behind maiden pole-sitter Kevin Magnussen of Haas and two-time champion Max Verstappen of Red Bull and cruised to a thrilling win in a frenzy 24-lap contest.

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz rounded out the podium position followed by his teammate Charles Leclerc who earlier barged after contact with McLaren’s Lando Norris.

After 71 laps of mayhem, these lot take home the points #BrazilGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/f9JXRGG9iJ

— Formula 1 (@F1) November 13, 2022

Verstappen, however, finished sixth after an early clash with Hamilton. He came in just behind Alpine’s Fernando Alonso and narrowly ahead of his teammate, Sergio Pérez as the late caution period help the world champion to move up from the bottom of the top 10.

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With his 14th win this year out of 20 races, Verstappen has surpassed the tally previously held by Michael Schumacher, who sealed 13 wins from 18 races in 2004 and Sebastian Vettel, who took 13 from 19 in 2013. Verstappen has reached the landmark with two races still left.

The double-world champion also clinched the record for the most points in a season with his thumping win on Sunday.

Most-ever points scored in a season

Max Verstappen #MexicoGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/PfWwHFsVcp

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 30, 2022

The world champion held off a challenge from Lewis Hamilton in the first part of the race before pulling away leaving the Mercedes driver to fend off Sergio Perez for the runners-up spot.

“I never thought I would be able to win 14 races in a year, I am incredibly proud,” he said. “We’re definitely enjoying it and we’ll try to go for more.”

After a race that was devoid of any real thrills and entirely focused on tyre strategy, Red Bull’s Perez came in third ahead of Mercedes’ George Russell in front of his jubilant home crowd.

Mercedes’ bet on taking hard rubber over Red Bull’s medium apparently looked convincing strategy but, with the degradation not as severe as expected, they remained hapless to take down the world champion.

George Russell finished fourth for Mercedes while Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc took fifth and sixth position for Ferrari. Daniel Ricciardo and Lando Norris were seventh and ninth for McLaren, Esteban Ocon eighth for Alpine and Valtteri Bottas 10th for Alfa Romeo.

The points scorers in Mexico City #MexicoGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/xJFaLXCrf8

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 30, 2022

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Red Bull’s title win, with three races to spare, put an end to Mercedes’ eight-year streak, who failed to win a race in the ongoing season.

Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton seemed to have claimed a much-needed triumph for his team as he was leading with 15 laps to go.

Verstappen, however, reeled him with seven laps to spare and went on to win the sprint.

Ferrari, on the other hand, needed to outperform Red Bull by 19 points in US GP to keep constructors’ crown hopes alive, but Charles Leclerc was the only finisher for the team after battling his way up from 12th on the grid to finish third.

Teammate Carlos Sainz, who started on the pole position, had to retire in the first lap after a devastating collision with Mercedes’ George Russell.

Consequently, Red Bull now have unassailable 656 points to Ferrari’s 469.

Verstappen’s victory at US Open was his 13th of the season, equalling the Formula One record held jointly with Ferrari great Michael Schumacher and Vettel, and the 33rd of his career.

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Red Bull driver Verstappen was awarded the title only when his closest competitor Charles Leclerc was demoted to third place by a five-second penalty.

Verstappen clinched the title for the second time in a row after a dominant season in which he has won 12 of 18 races, including six of the last seven.

The outcome at Suzuka gave Red Bull driver an unassailable 113-point lead in the current championship, becoming only the third driver after Michael Schumacher and Sebastian Vettel to claim the title with four races to spare.

An unbeatable lead for Max Verstappen #JapaneseGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/AKlUPLDLgW

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 9, 2022

Ferrari’s Leclerc had finished second on the track, keeping the title race alive, but cutting a circuit in the final circuit took a toll on his ambitions as he was awarded a five-second penalty, thus he and Pérez swapped positions.

The points scorers at Suzuka #JapaneseGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/ENIVQpvikb

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 9, 2022

“We’ve been absolutely on it, the whole year. A season where we had a difficult start but kept it cool, bounced back and never let go,” expressed Verstappen on his official Twitter account after victory and thanked his fans for their support.

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