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Red Bull driver and double world champion Max Verstappen was seen online at 2 am after the Hungarian GP qualifying session with his Team Redline.
The Dutch driver was visibly disappointed when he finished second behind his rival the Mercedes driver, Lewis Hamilton, in the fight for the pole position at the 2023 Hungarian Grand Prix qualifying session on Saturday (22 Jun). He missed out on the front of the grid by just 0.003s to the Mercedes driver who ended his drought of pole positions in the sport since Miami.
It is no secret that Max Verstappen spends a lot of his free time racing online with his Team Redline, participating in various virtual races such as Le Mans and Daytona 24 Hours. So, it was not surprising to see him wipe off his disappointment with some online racing.
Max Verstappen on his chances of winning the 2023 Hungarian GP
Max Verstappen stated that he expects the team, and the car, to be quick on Sunday but also pointed out that it was very difficult to overtake at the Hungaroring usually.
In his post-qualifying press conference, Max Verstappen said:
"Yeah, I mean, I only used the Soft yesterday and it was a lot colder as well. So it's not really that representative of what will happen tomorrow when it will be even warmer. I think also yesterday maybe some other cars were still a little bit more off-pace compared to today."
"So, normally, like Lewis said as well, when they are upfront in Qualifying normally, their race car is also quite strong. So I don't expect it to be a very straightforward race. I mean, I expect us to be quick, but around here it's not easy to pass, especially when you're quite closely matched on pace."
When asked about the gap between the top three in qualifying, he said:
"Yeah, I mean, for sure, for everyone it looks good, right? I mean, I'm just not happy with how my Qualifying went, just because of the balance. It has nothing to do with the gaps to other teams. But for sure, I think this Qualifying was very exciting, because every session, basically, you didn't really know who was actually going to be quickest, right? So I think that's a good thing."
It will be fascinating to see if on Sunday the winning streak of Red Bull and Max Verstappen will be broken.
