Max Verstappen concedes engine penalty is ‘likely’ in Belgium as he admits Red Bull’s competitiveness is an ‘unknown’

“But again, a race can always be turned upside down with moments. We have to be open minded and try to make the best of it. That’s what we’ll try to do. At the moment, I also don’t know how competitive we’re going to be here.

“Also a few places there’s new tarmac, so we need to see how the tyres respond to that as well. So still a lot of unknowns. Obviously with the weather, quite a bit of rain expected on Friday and Saturday. So yeah, just need to follow the weather and just progression through the weekend, and see how competitive we are.”

BETTING GUIDE: Who are the favourites as F1 heads to Belgium for the final race before the summer break?

Verstappen has previously won in Belgium from 14th on the grid in 2022 and from sixth one year later. Asked if P8 was the maximum he could expect this weekend, the Dutch driver responded: “I hope a little bit more, but let’s see. I don’t know, it’s difficult to predict at the moment.”