Tom Clarkson

Is Max Verstappen the best you've ever seen?

What makes him so good?

Compare now, if you would, the Max Verstappen of today to the Max Verstappen of 2015, when he first came in, aged 17.

Tell me about, I was going to ask, is he a team leader?

Is he someone all the troops want to get behind?

You say he's still getting better.

Does that mean that 2025 has been his best season?

Even better than 2023 when he won 19 out of 22 races?

Helmut's been at Red Bull Racing from the very beginning.

He knows the team inside out and he knows its personalities, as proven by what he's just said about Max.

I think Red Bull will miss Helmut's experience now that he's no longer in the team because he does understand racing.

It'll be interesting to see if they replace him.

Now, the biggest story going into 2025 was the arrival of Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari for his first season in red.

But despite a sprint pole and sprint victory at the second round in China, Lewis's debut season at Ferrari was very disappointing.

The Scuderia wasn't as competitive as they were last year, enduring their first winless season since 2021.

And Lewis completed a season without a Grand Prix podium for the first time in his F1 career.

When team principal Fred Vasseur came on the show in the middle of the year, he admitted that Lewis's transition from Mercedes to Ferrari was more challenging than they'd expected.

I'm fascinated about the change, right?

I get that Ferrari is an Italian team and everything that's happening in Maranello is probably very different to things that are going on in Brackley and at Woking in the UK with Mercedes and McLaren.

But that bit out on track, is that that different when you change team?