Max Verstappen thinks Red Bull can win every race this season

Max Verstappen believes Red Bull and its so far extremely dominant RB19 could win every single grand prix on the F1 calendar this season. Sounds ominous.

Red Bull has won six races out of six in 2023, putting it more than a quarter of the way towards a clean sweep of the 22 events scheduled for the year. Would’ve been 24 of course, but Imola was rained off and China was cancelled.

The Dutchman has won four races so far, while teammate Sergio Perez has collected the other two. And only once has another team taken the chequered flag within 20 seconds of the nearest Red Bull, and that was in Australia when a late stoppage bunched up the field.

When asked ahead of this weekend’s Spanish GP if Red Bull could turn this domination into a full season of race wins, Verstappen said: “I think we can, but that's very unlikely to happen. You know, there are always things that go wrong, or you have a retirement or whatever. But purely on pace, I think at the moment, it looks like that.

“But we will always get to tracks maybe where it doesn't work out exactly, or whatever. Bad luck in qualifying, you make your own mistakes…”

The bad news for the rest of the field is that the RB19 has had supreme speed in both qualifying and the race on wildly different types of circuit, from the high-speed track in Saudi Arabia to the slow ‘n’ twisty streets of Monaco. Which kinda suggests Adrian Newey’s design doesn’t have an Achilles heel.

Even Mercedes’ George Russell admits there’s a chance no other team will get a sniff at victory this season. “Like Max said, on pure pace for sure they've got the potential, but certain things can happen. And I'd like to think we'll be able to fight at some point and take advantage of some misfortune, down the order. But yes, it's challenging.”

The closest a team has come to a full season of wins was in 1988, when McLaren’s MP4/4 won 15 out of 16 races as Ayrton Senna narrowly beat Alain Prost to the title. What do you reckon, could it finally happen in 2023?