In 2023, Max Verstappen bagged 21 podiums, and in a solid record-breaking manner, he stood on top steps in 19 races out of those. Red Bull entered unprecedented dominance in 2023, a momentum many thought the team would bring to 2024 as the competitors failed to catch up to them second year in a row. At the 2024 Bahrain testing, many stakeholders even claimed that Max and Red Bull might look to make a clean sweep this year.

But little did they know; in the first 14 races of 2024, Max only won 6 that too with strikingly close competition. To give you context, Mercedes has won 3 of the last four races, with one of them going to McLaren and Red Bull struggling to make it to the podium. With the Dutch GP set to break the monotony of summer break, one question looms: Can Max Verstappen win at home?

Max Verstappen aims to “fight for the win” at Dutch GP

Max Verstappen has a comfortable lead in the driver’s championship, with Lando Norris being a far second. Though Red Bull’s constructor title faces solid competition from McLaren’s driver duo, no single driver has been able to challenge Verstappen’s dominance yet. After a hiatus of 35 years, the Dutch GP made a comeback to the F1 calendar in 2021, just at the right time when their own was on the horizon of embarking on an unseen era of dominance.

Since then, Max Verstappen has not let another other nation’s national anthem play at his home turf. This year, he will look to extend that dominance further after the summer break recharge. As covered by GP blog, in an outlook from his team, Verstappen stated, “It was good to spend some time relaxing with family and friends over the summer break and we are feeling refreshed and ready for the second half of the season. It is great to start it back at my home race, it is always a fantastic atmosphere, and the fans are incredible, so it is a special one for me.”

“It is a great circuit, with its short straights and narrow track and hopefully, we can come back even stronger for this race. We are looking forward to the week ahead and hopefully, we can be fighting for the win,” Max further added. But will he win the home GP as easily as he did in the past years? Lewis Hamilton‘s recent performance may answer that in the negative.

Lewis Hamilton’s momentum can prove deadly for Max Verstappen and Co.

Lewis Hamilton was downbeat and running on zero ‘incentives’ for 2022 and 2023. In furtherance of this, he was asked by Sky Sports what the best thing was in 2023, “the fact I survived it”. Miraculously, in 2024, after a wait of 945 days, he finally found redemption during his home race. He won his 104th GP at Silverstone, which became a record-breaking 9th win at a single circuit. To add to that, he extended his already glorious maximum wins record. Post that, he won his 105th two races later after his teammate George Russell’s unfortunate disqualification.

On the contrary, only one of the two RB20s has been on a voyage to the top step of the podium, and the machine hasn’t quite lived up to the dominance of its predecessor. For context, Red Bull’s cumulative point tally has been shattered week after week by the McLaren duo and Verstappen’s wins have now been challenged by Lewis. Though Milton Keynes blames the sluggish pace on saturation development, it still doesn’t take away the fact that they want to win. And Lewis is set to give them a hard time.

The problem at hand right now is Zandvoort; if we consider all the factors at play for the Dutch GP this year, Mercedes might be able to tip the scales in their favor. A chance of rain for a strong wet weather driver like Lewis may help him a chance at redemption. For context, in 2022, after multiple safety cars and being overtaken by Russell and even Charles Leclerc, he lost the last podium position. But he wasn’t dominant that year, nowhere close to the mighty form he has been in for the past 4 races.

This year’s Dutch GP will surely be one to look out for. Who are you placing your bets on? Share in the comments below.