Max Verstappen's royal snub and F1's scariest car: Things you might've missed at the Dutch GP

Dutch Grand Prix

Verstappen's royal snub and F1's scariest car: Things you might've missed at the Dutch GP

Sunday's race in Zandvoort had some great sub-plots

Chris Deeley

Monday 26 August 2024 09:57

Lando Norris romped to victory at the Dutch Grand Prix on Sunday. You know that bit. You probably also know that he was joined on the podium by Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc. You might know that Mercedes finished seventh and eighth after a stinky, stinky weekend.

What about the things you don't know? What about the things, to drop in the title of the article, that you've missed?

F1 HEADLINES: Verstappen given shock FIA drugs test as star DISQUALIFIED ahead of Dutch Grand Prix

Article continues under video

There's no such thing as a race with nothing happening, and if you dozed off for a bit on the sofa – or just got distracted by Twitter or something, it's happened to all of us – do we have the column for you?

Well. Yes. Yes we do. That was rhetorical.

Scariest car on the grid

McLaren might have brought some speedy updates to Zandvoort, Haas may have brought a car that Nico Hulkenberg couldn't seem to reliably brake in for the first two days, but neither of them win the title of 'new scariest car on the grid'.

That dubious honour goes to...this thing. This float of some kind that participated in the pre-race procession. Did Makka Pakka spend a little too long in an Amsterdam cafe this weekend?

😭😭 pic.twitter.com/dKGX9oN062
— RBR Daily (@RBR_Daily) August 25, 2024

The Creature – we will only call it The Creature – is clearly begging for death. It would be cruel not to acquiesce.

Making the impossible look easy (and boring)

Do you want to hear something crazy? Flippity gompa hoogitz. Do you want to hear something crazy and coherent? Ted Kravitz was once hospitalised after swallowing a live vole. Do you want to hear something crazy, coherent and actually true? For the third time this season, every driver who started the race finished it.

'That's not so crazy'? 'That happened three times last year too'? Well get your brains around this one – before 2005 (that's less than 20 years ago, fact fans) – that had only happened once in F1 history.

That was also at Zandvoort back in 1961 when 15 of 15 starters made it to the chequered flag, and it didn't happen again until 2005, when 6 of 6 made it to the end of the infamous US Grand Prix of that year.

A full 20 made it all the way later that year in Italy, and the floodgates opened...sort of. No, actually, it only happened twice more in the decade following that! 'To finish first, first you must finish' used to really mean something, kids. These bulletproof machines have ruined a little bit of the unpredictability we love so much.

Verstappen's royal snub

Max Verstappen's a polite young man, isn't he? Loves his home fans, loves his home crowd (not enough to live there instead of Monaco, but there we go), loves his country's royal family (but not enough to shake one of their hands on the podium---wait WHAT?)

Yep, eagle-eyed GPFans chief Stuart Hodge spotted Dutch sporting royalty appear to swerve actual Dutch royalty as he walked onto the podium after the race, missing (deep breath!) Prince Bernhard van Oranje-Nassau van Vollenhoven's handshake attempt.

Poor guy just got swerved by Verstappen as he went for the handshake 😳🥶 pic.twitter.com/iypaxwcF8m
— Stuart Hodge (@Hodgeythehack) August 25, 2024

Obvious disclaimer here that we're sure Max didn't see him, no malice involved, laser-focused on the podium, definitely not in a strop, all that good stuff.

But what if there's a secret grudge? The self-published novels write themselves.

The hype machine never stops

North Korean state controlled media has nothing on the propaganda efforts of professional sporting bodies. NBA finals turning into a blowout? 'Watch a HISTORIC performance from the Celtics'. Chelsea beat Wolves 6-2 in a very dull game of football? 'Eight-goal THRILLER!'

So it's no specific slander on the greater F1 media apparatus when we say that their protestations that Sunday's race was 'scintillating' are just not flying. Not to put too fine a point on it, it was Not A Classic.