'You don't know racing': Verstappen's fiery Chinese GP claim explained

Max Verstappen launched his biggest attack on F1 2026 racing yet after the Chinese Grand Prix and insulted anyone who likes it in the process, but did this weekend actually prove him wrong? Verstappen's made his disdain for the 2026 rules very obvious for a long time and his vocal criticism shows no sign of slowing down. In fact, it's only got worse, with an astonishing inflammatory broadside against the terrible racing which he labelled a joke. Verstappen also said, if someone likes this, then you really don't know what racing is like. It's probably not helped by just how bad his and Red Bull's situation is, as Verstappen failed to finish the Chinese Grand Prix and didn't score a point in Saturday's sprint race either. He spent both as a midfielder, being outqualified and beaten by cars from Alpine, Haas and Racing Bulls across the weekend. Verstappen has just 8 points, 43 fewer than Mercedes Championship leader George Russell, making this the second worst start to a season in his career, tied with 2018 and only one point better off than his rookie year with Toro Rosso in 2015. As Mercedes boss Toto Wolff put it, Max is in a horror show with a car that is horrendous to drive. And Verstappen himself has admitted that Red Bull's car was his biggest problem in China, not its engine and certainly not the rules. It's not dissimilar to how Fernando Alonso, driving that horribly underpowered and unreliable Aston Martin-Honda mess, is decrying the rules constantly too. Alonso labelled it a battery world championship and pointed to how four cars failing to even take the start because of technical problems was the worst show you can have. We also know that McLaren's Lando Norris is no fan of 2026 either. So are the disgruntled world champions just being sore losers in all this, having ended up with the wrong machinery for the new rules era? Verstappen's title chances do look extremely distant, even assuming Red Bull can launch a massive development turnaround. But he insists his position against the rules has nothing to do with the competitive order. Verstappen says he would say the same thing even if he was winning races because he cares about the racing product, it's not about being upset with where I am. It's tough to really believe that because it does seem to be that Verstappen's mood turns whenever he has to drive his car. Early in the China weekend, Verstappen had actually sounded slightly more optimistic about the rules. He said there were discussions ongoing to make some progress and hopefully in the short term too. As soon as the track action started and Red Bull suffered an even worse weekend than its season opener, Verstappen's tune changed. It peaked post-race when he lamented it as playing Mario Kart, not racing, and that it comes down to boosting past, then you run out of battery, the next straight they boost past you again. But is this actually what happened in China? This weekend seemed to present a more tempered version of the yoyo racing that dominated the early laps of the opener at the energy-starved Melbourne track a week earlier. Verstappen was among many, including me, who felt that was artificial and problematic. And he did have a point in China when he dismissed Ferrari's early disruption of Mercedes' victory march out front as just a consequence of Ferrari's mega starts, then it takes a few laps to sort it all out. There is no great racing for victory on display here. But decrying everything that happened in the China races as solely down to the battery situation and going as far as claiming viewers who take enjoyment in it do not understand racing isn't fair or accurate. What kind of racing you like isn't just divided into are you a new fan or an old fan, a real fan or a fake fan. There's variation in opinion regardless of how long you've watched F1 for. If Max doesn't like this, fine, he doesn't have to, but there's no need to insult people who do. Especially when there was actually some stuff to like in China. I'm happy to fall into the category of people that Verstappen thinks doesn't know anything about racing because, to me, it didn't quite play out as he's claimed. There's still way too much randomness at the start, potential for a false order created by technical variables that go beyond driver skill, and some big differences in battery usage that make for some very low-stakes, low-meaning drive-bys back and forth. But to me, the ratio of that to more satisfying racing was a lot better in China, which showcased the better side of the 2026 rules more, the cars. Across the sprint and the Grand Prix, the action shifted more from the straights to where it should always count most, the corners. Cars were vying for position under braking, running wheel-to-wheel, cutting back quickly, and generally just racing more dynamically than the ground effect era tended to allow. Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc fought wheel-to-wheel a lot during this race, and the Ferrari teammates were keen to make it clear how much fun that was. Hamilton even went as far as describing it as the best racing I've ever experienced in Formula 1. That's probably a step too far in the other direction, and plenty of other drivers, especially in the midfield with Verstappen, disagree, but maybe that points to where the problem is. When there's so many cars in close proximity, the impact of the battery swings is probably exaggerated. There was a good example of that when Verstappen was trying to pick off multiple cars, got past one Haas, and then nearly rear-ended the other because he had so much more battery to spend. Perhaps in more isolated fights, especially when cars are on similar or the same deployment strategies, the demands switch, and then we get the best of slightly smaller, lighter, nimbler cars. Was it perfect? Absolutely not, and F1 shouldn't get smug that a better spectacle, some fun if brief fighting at the very front, and a lot of overtakes make this a roaring success all of a sudden. But overall it was better, and that's coming from someone who was extremely critical of what we saw in Australia. So maybe Verstappen will soften his stance slightly if he watches back some of the wheel-to-wheel racing, and hopefully others, because as we've said, Max isn't the only driver who feels this way. This was an order of magnitude better than the most farcical parts of Australia, and if Verstappen recognises that, it will actually help the rest of his criticism rather than letting it all blend into one. The bad news for Verstappen is the prospect of an immediate rules tweak to try to improve the show for the next race in Japan is now off the table. A planned post-China review of the rules and how to make the energy management demands less significant is now not going to happen until after the next race. That will take advantage of the new month-long gap without any Grand Prix in April following the cancellation of the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian Grand Prix and means nothing will change before the Miami race at the start of May. You can keep up to date with what F1 decides to do, what happens during F1's unexpected hiatus and the racing that does happen around it by joining the race members club. You can get 90% off your first month at the moment and enjoy behind the scenes insight, exclusive podcasts and special bonus content whether F1 races are happening or not. Just check out the link in the description to claim your 90% discount. F1 and the FIA were open to changes as they knew the rules had created the conditions for a problematic spectacle. This was certainly the case in Australia because the track there made charging the battery so difficult. And while it's still very much the case that every team's priority is to maximise the charging and discharging of the battery, even in qualifying, at least in wasn't such a dominant factor. And as we've said, other parts of the rules did come to the fore. That's why the intense criticism of the rules following Australia from drivers, fans and paddock insiders like us faded a little this weekend. There's still a belief that some aspects definitely need addressing, especially the qualifying spectacle and some overtly complex elements to the regulations. But these concerns don't seem to be big enough worries to force the rulemakers into knee-jerk changes. F1's convinced that the Sprint and Grand Prix in China were entertaining enough that the spectacle is not a problem. But as Shanghai was a much friendlier circuit for charging the battery and how teams manage strategies around that, getting a greater understanding from a third event in Japan will help make the true reality of the 2026 rules that little bit clearer. To be fair to Verstappen, he wasn't expecting anything fundamental to shift immediately. His hope was more about doing something for 2027 to mitigate the worst parts of the current rules and then get rid of them as soon as possible. A switch to V8s with no electric element and only sustainable fuels has been earmarked as F1's next set of regulations a few years down the line. Verstappen says it's painful that can't come as early as next year and that this current set is fundamentally flawed and can only be helped a little. He's also probably not going to be too impressed with the line F1's trying to take at the moment. Some have either been convinced that the majority of fans genuinely love F1 2026 or they are very selective in what they use to make that judgment. Wolf for example claimed that all the indicators, all the data say people love it and that message is coming from F1 itself. Given so many fans were in uproar at the notion of F1 censoring them by hiding negative replies on social media after Australia, it's stating the extremely obvious to point out that the rules remain divisive and are not universally enjoyed by engaged fans. If a more casual viewership is the reference or the total number of people watching F1 races is being contorted into proof that people love what they are seeing, then maybe you could argue there is more enjoyment than there is scepticism overall. But if F1 genuinely thinks this is better for a wider, more casual audience and that's what F1 wants to go for, then Verstappen's warn them not to let that impact its decision making or it will come and bite them back in the arse.