World championship leader Max Verstappen was booed by fans at Silverstone at last year's British Grand Prix; watch every session from the British GP live on Sky Sports F1 and for free on Sky Showcase this weekend
Friday 7 July 2023 11:39, UK
Max Verstappen does not expect the crowd to be "against" him at this weekend's British Grand Prix and says the event is not an "away game" for him.
The world championship leader, who moved 81 points clear in Austria last weekend as he claimed a fifth successive race victory, has previously come in for negative treatment from fans at Silverstone.
Following an intense title battle with Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton in 2021, Verstappen was heavily booed at the 2022 British Grand Prix, with the Red Bull driver left to express his 'disappointment' at the situation.
With the once heated rivalry between the drivers - and their teams - having somewhat cooled given the Dutchman's almost total dominance over the last 12 months, Verstappen is hopeful history won't repeat itself.
Asked about his expectations, he said: "I don't know if the crowd is against me, and it's not an away game, it's our home Grand Prix as well.
"I spend a lot of time in Milton Keynes. It's an important race for us, we enjoy coming here, and I don't see it as having to prove anything against the crowd or whatever.
"I'm just here to have a good race and try to win it."
Silverstone is one of few tracks where Verstappen has failed to win in the previous two seasons, with a crash with Hamilton ending his race in 2021 before damage suffered in 2022 saw him end in seventh.
Despite the misfortune of those incidents, Verstappen insists he has no additional motivation to claim victory on Sunday.
"Just sometimes you have a bit of bad luck like last year, but we know that our car is probably better and more competitive than last year," he said.
"I'm just looking forward to the weekend to be honest and hopefully we can just have a good result."
After sharing two victories apiece with team-mate Sergio Perez over the first four races of the season, Verstappen has discovered a supreme level of form that has enabled him to equal his career-best streak of successive wins.
The 25-year-old led every lap of victories in Monaco, Spain and Canada, and it was only a divergence of strategy that saw him temporarily trail Ferrari's Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz in Austria.
Verstappen says "a very tiny part" of him would prefer to be facing a greater challenge, but says he does not find Red Bull's dominance "boring" in the slightest.
"I put it like this, I've had so many years where we were very close, or we thought we were very close, and you think next year is going to be the year, and then again it wasn't… for various reasons," Verstappen said.
"And now that we are finally there, I am really enjoying the moment, I love what we're doing, what we're achieving as a team.
"People ask me, 'is it boring?' I say, 'no, it's not boring, because this is what I worked for.' All these years together with the team, everyone was so motivated to get into a position like this.
"So for us, we are enjoying it, we are of course also aware of the situation that now the other people are in the role we were before, and they are pushing flat out to try to catch up.
"We know that mentality, we know what they are trying to do, but we just try to stay there and push as hard as we can to stay on top, so for me it's definitely not boring at the moment."
Thursday July 6
6pm: The F1 Show (also streamed on YouTube and Sky Sports App)
Friday July 7
8:40am: F3 Practice
10am: F2 Practice
12pm: British GP Practice One (session starts 12:30pm)
2.05pm: F3 Qualifying
3pm: F2 Qualifying
3:40pm: British GP Practice Two (session starts 4pm)
Saturday July 8
9:15am: F3 Sprint
11:15am: British GP Practice Three (session starts 11:30am)
1:10pm: F2 Sprint
2:15pm: British GP Qualifying build-up
3pm: BRITISH GP QUALIFYING
5pm: Ted's Qualifying Notebook
Sunday July 9
8:10am: F3 Feature Race
9:50am: F2 Feature Race
11:50am: Porsche Supercup
1:30pm: Grand Prix Sunday - British GP build-up
3pm: The BRITISH GRAND PRIX
5pm: Chequered Flag: British GP reaction
6pm: Ted's Notebook
Next on the F1 calendar is the big one, Silverstone. Don't miss the British GP live on Sky Sports from July 7-9
