Max Verstappen issued defence: 'Everybody was laughing at him'

Jos Verstappen has stated that "everybody was laughing" at his son Max when he originally raised concerns over the 2026 F1 cars.

The challengers this year have been built under a new set of regulations with changes made to the aerodynamics and the power units.

However, they have left Verstappen far from impressed, who described the cars as "Formula E on steroids" and "anti-racing" during pre-season testing.

Drivers now need to heavily manage energy harvesting and deployment, a factor that heavily dictates lap time.

Speaking to Viaplay, Verstappen senior insisted his son's complaints are nothing new.

"Max was speaking about this two or three years ago," Jos said.

"He saw some data, but everybody was laughing at him at that time. [They were saying] 'Max was negative', and things like that.

"Now they have the regulations there, everybody can see it. So they should listen a little bit more to the drivers. But they don't."

Issues such as the starting procedure and wheel-to-wheel racing with the new cars have been mentioned by the drivers across pre-season testing.

Verstappen has suggested that such headaches could have been avoided earlier if the decision makers sought input from the drivers.

"I understand, drivers shouldn't decide everything," the four-time champion said.

"But when it comes to quite some logical things about racing, or at least that we can give advice, we can even jump in the simulator and test stuff, you'll figure out stuff that is bad.

"That's where sometimes F1 or the FIA, they are not understanding how important a driver can be in decisions."