Juan Pablo Montoya echoes Marko on Verstappen’s 24 Hours of Nurburgring focus
juan pablo montoya fits the same pattern Helmut Marko is talking about: Max Verstappen has been putting more energy into endurance racing than Formula 1. Marko said that was already true last year, and he now sees Verstappen’s attention shifting toward the 24 Hours of Nurburgring.
Marko also said he fears Red Bull will not mount a serious championship challenge this year. That leaves Verstappen, a four-time drivers' champion and 71-time grand prix winner, in a different frame than the one Red Bull spent years selling: not just chasing wins, but wondering whether its lead driver is getting more satisfaction elsewhere.
Marko On Verstappen Online
Marko said he follows Verstappen’s sports car activity online and singled out the way the cars move through traffic. “I watch everything online. It's always impressive to see how they carve their way through the field,” he said.
He was then asked directly whether Verstappen currently finds more enjoyment in endurance racing than Formula 1. Marko’s answer was blunt: “That was already the case last year.”
That line lands because it does more than describe a hobby. Verstappen has been increasingly vocal about his dissatisfaction with F1’s current direction, and the endurance-racing interest now sits next to that frustration instead of beside it as a harmless extra.
Red Bull's Flat Outlook
Marko’s warning on Red Bull was just as sharp. “I fear it won't happen this year,” he said when discussing whether the team can mount a serious championship challenge.
The concern matters because it points to a season in which Red Bull is still trying to regain its dominant form under team principal Laurent Mekies, with Isack Hadjar alongside Verstappen. If the car is not giving him what he wants and the championship picture is thin, the pull toward other racing projects becomes harder to ignore.
Marko also said he is not in contact often with Verstappen, and he would not try to judge retirement talk properly from a distance. “No. That's why I can't give you any news about him,” he said when asked about regular contact, and, on the idea of a possible end-of-2026 retirement, “I'm too far away to judge that properly. From the outside, I don't give advice about that.”
For Red Bull, the immediate read is simple: the team is dealing with a driver whose attention is not locked solely on Formula 1, while its former adviser is publicly lowering expectations for this year’s title fight. That is the real pressure point in Marko’s comments, and it is already visible in the way he describes Verstappen’s racing life now.
