'Starting early!' Max Verstappen is already preparing baby Lily for a sim racing career

Thumbnail of sim racing setup and Verstappen — Photo: © IMAGO

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'Starting early!' Max Verstappen is already preparing baby Lily for a sim racing career

Max Verstappen welcomed his first daughter with Kelly Piquet last year

Sam Cook Digital Journalist

Sports Journalist who has been covering motorsport since 2023

Tuesday 20 January 2026 22:57

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Four-time F1 world champion Max Verstappen revealed during a live racing event that his baby daughter Lily is starting to become interested in his sim racing activities.

Verstappen and his partner Kelly Piquet welcomed Lily into the world in May 2025, and she is Verstappen's first child.

He has regularly spoken since then about how she has changed his perception of life, making him realise how little F1 really means now that he has a family to go back to at the end of each race weekend.

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And the Dutchman is known to have many hobbies away from F1 too, including GT3 racing, being a racing team owner through Verstappen.com Racing, and of course sim racing, which has been a big part of his life away from F1 in recent years.

It seemed during a recent event that baby Lily wanted to get involved in the online racing too, with Verstappen revealing that the bright screens grab her attention.

"I've got Lily on my lap," Verstappen said during a live stream. "She keeps trying to grab the microphone!

"[She's] having a good time, playing, she's very interested in all the screens, the controller, the mouse, everything, trying to touch everything. Starting early," the champion joked.

Of course, Lily hasn't even turned one yet and is likely to just be impressed by the bright lights at this stage, but she does have the racing genes to one day be a success if that is the path she decides to go down!

Lily Verstappen-Piquet's family tree

It's not just Verstappen who has passed on some racing genes to his baby daughter, she has a family full of racing stars.

Max Verstappen

Hailed as the greatest racing talent of his generation, and now firmly in the discussion for the greatest F1 driver of all time, Verstappen has four world titles to his name and is only 28 years old.

In addition to this, Verstappen also has 71 race victories, 48 pole positions and 127 podiums in F1, and sits below only Michael Schumacher and Lewis Hamilton in the all-time list of grand prix wins.

Kelly Piquet

Kelly Piquet is the daughter of three-time F1 world champion Nelson Piquet and Sylvia Tamsma, but is herself a model and columnist.

Whilst Piquet has never taken part in competitive racing, she is embedded in the motorsport world thanks to her father and partner, whom she frequently supports from the Red Bull garage on race weekends.

Nelson Piquet

Nelson Piquet won the F1 world drivers' championship in 1981, 1983, and 1987, battling the likes of Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell during his career.

The Brazilian racing driver has 23 grand prix victories, alongside 24 pole positions and 60 podiums, but has also raced outside of F1.

In 1992 and 1993, Piquet attempted the Indy 500 with Team Menard.

Piquet also took part in the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1996 and 1997, but a victory also eluded him in both of these events.

Jos Verstappen

Father of Max Verstappen and paternal grandfather to Lily-Verstappen Piquet, Verstappen Sr competed in F1 from 1994 until 2003, where he claimed two podiums in his first season with Benetton.

Verstappen Sr won the 2008 24 Hours of Le Mans in the LMP2 class, and won the LMP2 title the same year.

In recent years, the Dutchman has turned to rally, and currently competes in the European Rally Championship.

Sophie Kumpen

Sophie Kumpen is not only Max Verstappen's mother and Lily's grandmother, but also a former racing driver who competed in touring car racing in the 1990s, and is the 1995 Andrea Margutti Trophy karting champion.

At 17, the Belgian driver finished ahead of former F1 driver Giancarlo Fisichella in the karting world championship, and also competed against Jenson Button and Christian Horner during her karting career.

In a recent interview, Horner said of Kumpen: "I raced against Max’s mum [Kumpen] in 1989 in the junior kart world championship. In that race, there were some super-talented drivers: Jan Magnussen, Jarno Trulli, Giancarlo Fisichella and Dario Franchitti. She was top 10 in the world, for sure."

However, Kumpen quit racing in 1996 to focus on raising her children Max and Victoria Verstappen, after she married Jos Verstappen. The pair separated in 2008.

Nelson Piquet Jr

Son of Nelson Piquet and Kelly Piquet's older brother, Piquet Jr is Lily Verstappen-Piquet's uncle and yet another family member that has enjoyed a racing career.

The Brazilian driver competed in F1 from 2008 until 2009, where he picked up a podium finish at the 2008 German Grand Prix.

Piquet Jr then switched to racing in America, where he completed one race in the NASCAR Cup Series, before competing in the Xfinity and Truck Series where he earned three wins across both series.

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Written by

Sam Cook - Digital Journalist

Sam Cook is a talented young sports journalist and social media professional who now specialises in Formula 1, having previously worked as a football journalist and a local news reporter for a variety of different brands.

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F1 Red Bull Max Verstappen Lily Verstappen-Piquet