Max Verstappen role in McLaren signing discussions unveiled

F1 star Gabriel Bortoleto has revealed that Max Verstappen has helped him during contract negotiations with teams.

Verstappen has been in F1 since 2015, winning four world championships in that time, and, at the age of just 28, he is now considered one of the elder statesman in the sport.

A plethora of young drivers have joined the grid in recent years, and there were six drivers taking part in their first full season on the grid in 2025 before Jack Doohan was axed after just six races.

And one of those rookies struck up a brilliant relationship with Verstappen during the course of the season, even appearing on sim racing events and gaming streams with the Dutchman.

Gabriel Bortoleto won the 2024 F2 championship before joining Sauber for 2025, and now he has revealed that he and Verstappen have shared a close relationship for many years, stretching back to Bortoleto's F3 days.

"I have had a great friendship with Max for a long time already," Bortoleto told RacingNews365.

"I believe it's exposed now in the media, because you guys see me with him, going around, sometimes doing some live streams, playing games and stuff.

"Obviously, we have got closer and closer in Formula 1 because we are racing together, and we spend a lot of time together, and he is a great guy.

"What many people don't know is that he has helped me so much throughout my career, even when I was in the junior formulas."

Bortoleto continued, talking about the help Verstappen gave him when making certain decisions in racing: "I'm used to asking him a lot about things, even my own contracts, when I was still in the junior series. When I was about to sign for McLaren, I asked him for his opinion. When I was about to join Sauber, I also asked him about it.

"He has been involved, even if people don't really know about it, in a way that he has always been able to help me if I had any questions.

"He was not telling me what to do, but he was giving me his opinion about things on questions I asked him, and that's very nice of him because he doesn't really need to do that."

Bortoleto's F1 career so far

Bortoleto signed on as a McLaren young driver in 2023, after winning the F3 championship as a teenager.

Having clearly excelled in that series, the step up to F2 for the Brazilian in 2024 also came with real ease, with Bortoleto winning the title after an intense rivalry with Red Bull driver Isack Hadjar.

After a spluttering start, Bortoleto claimed his first podium in Imola with the Invicta Racing team, before achieving his first series victory at the Red Bull Ring and going on to claim six more podiums on the way to the title.

He was signed by Sauber at the end of 2024 on a long-term deal, meaning that the Brazilian was already guaranteed a seat with the team when they turned into Audi ahead of the 2026 season.

Nonetheless, Bortoleto drove brilliantly well in 2025, and would almost certainly have landed himself another contract even if his initial deal was just a one-year contract.

Bortoleto's manager is two-time world champion Fernando Alonso through the Spaniard's A14 Management agency, so with Alonso and Verstappen it's clear that the Brazilian has some pretty good guiding voices in the early stages of his F1 career.

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