Jonathan Wheatley has seen Max Verstappen from closer quarters than most, and he didn’t bother dressing up his verdict after Baku: “It was a masterclass.”
Sauber’s team principal — and Red Bull’s former sporting director — watched Verstappen thread the needle through a red-flag-happy qualifying and then control a stop-start Azerbaijan Grand Prix from pole to flag. While plenty of big names kissed concrete, Verstappen didn’t so much as glance at it. “He never looked like he was going to hit a wall,” Wheatley said. “He’s just extraordinary; he knows how to get the most out of that car.”
Coming from Wheatley, that carries weight. He was in the Red Bull garage when a teenage Verstappen arrived, when that famous 2016 Barcelona win detonated the status quo, and for a good chunk of the title run that followed. He knows the real thing when he sees it.
The bigger picture is shifting too. For much of the middle phase of 2025, McLaren had the field on a leash. Verstappen’s early-season punch was met with a heavier counter, and the championship narrative pointed papaya. Then came Monza. An upgraded floor went on the Red Bull, Verstappen found a cleaner edge, and he beat both McLarens with daylight to spare. Baku reinforced the trend: keep it clean on Saturday, convert it ruthlessly on Sunday. The old blueprint, reissued.
Oscar Piastri’s title lead took its first proper hit when he clattered out on lap one in Azerbaijan, scoring nothing while Verstappen banked the full haul. The gap shrank to 69 points. It’s still chunky, no question. But if you’ve watched Verstappen long enough, you also know why nobody inside a garage is sleeping easy on that number with seven rounds to go.
Wheatley put it more simply. “What’s the phrase; the cream rises to the top?” he said, a touch of amusement in the understatement. He’s right about the tracks, too: Baku rewards the brave and the precise in equal measure. Verstappen was both. The lap that secured pole never looked in doubt on the onboard — no sudden rescues, just small, tidy inputs. That tends to be the tell when he’s in one of those moods. The rest of the weekend becomes process.
There’s a cold efficiency to it that grinds down rivals and props up the paddock’s worst fears: that once Red Bull find a development seam, Verstappen opens it up all by himself. McLaren are still the reference over a season’s worth of form, but Verstappen’s last two wins suggest the terms of engagement have changed. He has momentum, and, for the first time in months, a car that looks like it’s meeting him halfway.
Wheatley, now charged with dragging Sauber up the order, didn’t need to be so effusive about a rival. But that’s the thing about Verstappen at full chat — it tends to turn hard-nosed operators into fans for a minute. “I’ve been constantly enjoying watching him racing for the last, I don’t know, since 2014 or something,” Wheatley said. “This weekend’s another example of that.”
Title talk? It’s premature to pretend the maths are friendly. But races have a habit of clumping in this sport: a clean run of Saturdays, a couple of Safety Cars that fall your way, and a championship can look very different very fast. Verstappen knows how to string those runs together better than anyone else in the field. And the man offering the compliment knows exactly what that looks like from the inside.
What Baku really did was reset the tone. McLaren still hold the cards, but the champion is reaching. The car’s sharper. The driver didn’t need to be. That’s the uncomfortable part for everyone chasing trophies: Verstappen’s baseline is already high. If the machinery truly has climbed back to it, this season may yet have a final act worth staying up for.
