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Former McLaren racer Juan Pablo Montoya felt that F1 would fear a Dutch boycott if Max Verstappen got banned for the Austrian GP. The race in Austria is the home race for Red Bull, and with the circuit being close to the Netherlands, a lot of people come from that part of the world to see the race.
The race in Austria will take place after the one in Canada, but Verstappen will be on a slippery surface. The Dutch driver's horrible error in judgment in Barcelona, where he rammed into the side of George Russell, ended up handing the driver three F1 penalty points.
Verstappen has 11 F1 penalty points, and according to the regulations, if you end up accruing 12 points, you get banned. If the Dutch driver picks up any points in Canada, he would be banned from the race in Austria. However, if he makes his way through the Austrian GP race weekend safely, two penalty points would expire.
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Juan Pablo Montoya discussed this on the Colombian F1 podcast Montoy'as, where he felt that the management would hope that Max Verstappen made his way safely through the weekend. The Austrian GP is 90% Dutch, and if Verstappen were not racing because he's banned, they might boycott the event. He said:
"The big question is whether Max Verstappen should actually skip a race if he gets a twelfth penalty point. Suppose he has to miss the Austrian GP because of that. 90% of the audience there is Dutch. Nobody would go to that race then. So what will it be? How will the public react? Will they sabotage the race, for example? I would not be surprised if they change the regulations before anything can happen."
He added:
"From a sporting point of view, they have to punish him, but that will cause a headache that I would not wish on anyone. Really, they will pray that Max Verstappen does nothing wrong."
How Max Verstappen ended up with 11 F1 penalty points
Max Verstappen ended up with 11 points in the last 12 months, which could be put down to some of the questionable tactics he was forced to apply last season. In 2024, when McLaren brought its major upgrade to Miami, that was the point where the car became level with Red Bull and then slowly started pulling away.
One of the keys to Verstappen holding on against Lando Norris in a faster car was entirely on playing with the gray area while defending positions. This led to a penalty in the Austrian GP last season. It also led to penalties in Mexico that made things harder for the driver.
One thing that needed to be kept in mind as well was the fact that last season, Kevin Magnussen was banned for reaching the 12 F1 penalty points threshold. If Magnussen has faced such a fate, the FIA cannot risk a tremendous backlash by giving Max Verstappen some kind of leeway in this situation.
