McLaren boss admits concern about Max Verstappen's recent form after the Dutch driver's two consecutive wins

McLaren boss Zak Brown has admitted that Max Verstappen's surge in recent races has been a cause of concern as the Red Bull driver continues to close the gap to Oscar Piastri. The second half of the season was expected to be a bit of a replica of the first half, where the duo from the Woking-based team battled it out for race wins every weekend.

This was also the case in Zandvoort, where Oscar Piastri won the race, but Lando Norris suffered a DNF, and Max Verstappen came home in second place. From Monza onwards, however, the script has been flipped.

At both Monza and Baku, Max Verstappen ended up dominating the field, and the McLaren duo just had nothing for him. In the F1 Italian GP, Verstappen beat both of them on the track, while in Baku, both Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris had a poor race anyway.

As a result, Oscar Piastri's championship lead has been slashed to 69 points by the Dutch driver. The surge has not gone unnoticed, as McLaren boss Zak Brown admitted that Verstappen's pace is something of a concern for the team, and the driver could not be counted out. He told Bloomberg:

“I think you have got to pay attention to Max. We have got to keep doing what we're doing. The constructors’ is looking very good. We had a chance to wrap it up in Baku, but let's not talk back at Baku. Hopefully we can get the job done in Singapore.”

McLaren boss hopes Max Verstappen is taken out of the title equation

Zak Brown revealed what would be the ideal scenario that he would prefer, and in that, the McLaren boss said that he'd love to see the title battle come down to the last race between two of his drivers. Hoping that Max Verstappen would drop out of contention, Brown said:

“What we want to do is we want our two drivers and Max - but we'd like to kind of get him out of there - to fight for the championship and just give them equal opportunity, equal equipment, which is what we're doing. May the best man win. That's what we want to do. We’d like to not play a role, if at all possible."

He added:

“Lando had a mechanical [failure, at Zandvoort] and things can happen, safety cars and things of that nature. Our goal is to just set Lando and Oscar up to be competing for the championship down to Abu Dhabi, and may the best driver win.”

Max Verstappen has been in brilliant form in the last couple of races, but it was on tracks with low downforce demands. The track in Singapore requires a completely different approach to car setups, and it would be interesting to see how he goes about it.