Runaway Formula 1 championship leader Max Verstappen, warns the rain forecast for the 2023 Belgian Grand Prix could interrupt his dominant streak as he searches for an eighth consecutive victory.
Rain is anticipated throughout the Sprint weekend at Spa-Francorchamps, with a 90 percent chance for Friday qualifying and Saturday’s sprint shootout and sprint race.
“It looks like the weekend will be quite rainy,” said Verstappen. “So we will see what the impact of the rain will be, which will make everything more interesting, but also more chaotic.
“Spa is obviously my favourite track on the calendar and I’m looking forward to racing there and seeing the many fans and the Sprint.”
How good is Verstappen in the wet?
Verstappen has a talent for the torrential conditions, in part due to his excellent feel for the limit of the car and his devastating consistency to be on the edge of that limit.
The reigning world champion won a memorable Japanese GP in 2022, where he won a second F1 title. The Dutchman pulled a 27-second gap in 28 laps over his teammate Sergio Perez, and Ferrari‘s Charles Leclerc.
But he has also been caught out previously. At the Singapore GP in the same year, Verstappen had a scary moment as he attempted to overtake Lando Norris.
The driver missed his braking zone and sailed straight on down an escape road, eventually going on to finish seventh.
The records continue to tumble
At the Hungarian GP, Red Bull broke McLaren‘s record of most consecutive F1 wins. The Milton Keynes-based team took victory at the Hungaroring to claim their 12th in a row, winning every race since the 2022 Abu Dhabi GP.
Red Bull are also going for an unprecedented 100 percent winning record in 2023, after emerging glorious in every single F1 2023 race. At the moment, it seems that only reliability or driver error can stop them from accomplishing the feat.
Whilst a personal milestone for Verstappen is on the horizon. Sebastian Vettel‘s record of nine consecutive wins is looking vulnerable as the Dutchman is now just two wins away from equalling that run, and three away from breaking it.
This is the second time Verstappen has been on the cusp of eclipsing Vettel‘s achievement. In 2022, the reigning world champion won eight of the final 10 races and his run of five-in-a-row was broken at the aforementioned Singapore GP.
If he had won that race, he would have won nine in a row before George Russell‘s Mercedes would have limited Verstappen to just nine at the Brazilian GP.
Where is the next F1 2023 race?
With the F1 circus finished in Budapest, we move on to the 2023 Belgian Grand Prix which will be held at Spa-Francorchamps over the weekend of July 28-30.
