letters [max verstappen]

9

Stavelot, Belgium

Only a week after Monaco and now I was in Belgium for Eurocup. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous, it was my first time ever at Spa and I hadn't managed to get more than an hour in on the simulator at Red Bull. To add to my nerves, Sophie and Victoria were coming to watch me race.

Practice and qualifying had gone surprisingly well. In practice, I was P5 after putting in the most laps out of anyone, and after a solid few hours of data analysis, I was able to push myself into P3 in qualifying, by far my best yet. Something about Spa just clicked, the way the corners flowed together had easily become etched in my brain and most of my nerves were gone.

The first race was on Saturday, and once I got a text from Victoria that she and her mom had arrived I made Anthoine come with me to find them. We were walking down the paddock when I spotted them, chatting with a track official that I guessed Sophie knew. Victoria made eye contact with me and we ran towards each other.

"It's so good to see you again!" I gushed as she jumped into my arms.

"I can't believe it's only been like 5 days, I missed you, lieverd!" She giggled. Sophie came up to us, and I hugged her too. "Are you going to introduce us to your handsome friend?" Victoria wiggled her eyebrows at Anthoine.

"Of course, Anthoine, this is Victoria and Sophie." I gestured to my teammate, who shook both of their hands.

"It's wonderful to meet you two." Anthoine said with a grin.

"Likewise." Victoria smirked. I looped my arm in hers as we started walking, while Anthoine struck up a conversation with Sophie.

"He has a girlfriend, Vic." I whispered.

"Boooo." She responded with a giggle.

——

Neither of them were strangers to a racetrack, so they entertained themselves, chatting with whoever had a free moment while I got ready for the race. We were out on the grid, waiting for the signal to get in our cars when Victoria came up to me again.

"I think I like this more than F1 races." She admitted to me while I was zipping up my race suit.

"Yeah, a bit more low-key, huh?" I remarked, and she nodded.

"Mhm, you seem way less stressed than Max ever does."

That got a chuckle out of me. "Trust me, before GP3 races I get really nervous. Honestly, I'm nervous now, I'm just holding it in." I admitted as I pulled my balaclava and helmet on.

"You're going to kill it! Go get a podium and then I'll make Max admit you're a better driver than him." She teased.

"Yeah, that'll be the day." I rolled my eyes. I got the signal from Henri to hop in the car and gave Vic a fistbump before following his orders. He started strapping me in while I pulled on my gloves, my mind running through the turns of the track.

"Radio check." Enzo called, and I gave a thumbs up in the direction of the pit wall.

"Loud and clear, Enzo. Let's do this!"

He chuckled. "I like that attitude. You put in the work in qualifying so if we just focus on defending and keeping up the pace today you're going to get yourself a fantastic result."

Everyone cleared the track, leaving just the 34 cars on the grid. We pulled out on the formation lap and back into our grid positions. My eyes were glued to the lights as they went on one by one- then they were out. My start was decent, I managed to escape a yellow flag behind me and held P3 for most of the race.