Max Verstappen is hopeful the Ferrari's of Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc as well as Mercedes can further aid his bid to catch McLaren in the F1 title race.
After the Mexico City GP, Verstappen finds himself 36 points behind points leader Lando Norris, and 35 behind Oscar Piastri with 116 left in the final four rounds.
Verstappen has carved nearly 70 points of Piastri since the Italian GP and halved the deficit to Norris as he seeks to deny McLaren a first drivers' title since 2008 and win himself a fifth straight crown.
In recent races, both Mercedes and Ferrari have been more competitive and claimed podium finishes ahead of either or both McLarens - something Verstappen hopes can continue as he embarks on his chase, although Hamilton is still yet to claim a first podium for the Scuderia.
When asked how Ferrari and Mercedes can aid his title bid, Verstappen dryly summarised the situation.
"By being faster than them, that would be nice," he told media, including RacingNews365.
"But first of all, we also need to be faster than McLaren to the end of the season to close the gap down.
"I mean, we had some good rounds where the gap came down, but now, to the end with four races, it's still a pretty big gap, and I need to score a lot more points every single weekend, which is not that straightforward.
"I mean, if you would give me the 2023 season with how everything was, and you tell me I'm 36 points behind with four races to go, I'm like: 'Yeah, no problem, easy,' but this season has been a little bit different.
"So it comes down to us optimising everything and nailing the weekend, and besides that, probably we need a little bit of luck at one round.
"You have to create a bigger [points] offset, but we're going to give it our all.
"If that's going to be enough at the end of the year, I don't know, but there's also not much to lose. I mean, worst case, we are P3 and best case, you will win the championship."
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