Max Verstappen is not counting himself out of winning the Belgian Grand Prix, but knows he has a difficult task on his hands.
The Dutchman’s Red Bull was the fastest on the grid, but a 10-place grid penalty has ensured that he will start the race in 11th position.
“I know that I have to start 10 places back so this was the best I could do today, and I go from there,” he said in his post-race interview. “I don’t know how quick we’re going to be. I hope that we can be in the mix to try to move forward.
“The race can be lost in Turn 1, so just need to see what happens at the start, naturally, and just go from there. It’s a very long race, it’s very hard on tyres and we just need to try to manage that as good as we can, and hopefully then we can be competitive tomorrow.
“We are not making it easy on ourselves and especially of course in the battle that we’re in. I know that today was a great day, but it’s in the wet, we need to be quick in the dry tomorrow. It’s going to be a tough battle.
“We’ll try to do the best we can. Hopefully we can battle the Ferrari and Mercedes ahead, and if we have a bit of luck, maybe we can challenge the McLaren.”
