Happy 10 years, Max Verstappen! Plus: Why the Canadian GP is important

May 15, 2026 is the 10th anniversary of Max Verstappen's first Formula 1 win. Mark Thompson / Getty Images Share articlePrime Tire Newsletter | This is The Athletic’s F1 newsletter. Sign up here to receive Prime Tire directly in your inbox twice a week during the season and weekly in the offseason. Welcome back to Prime Tire, where I’m pleased to report my $100 Miami Grand Prix hot dog expense was approved. I filed it under “newsgathering.” Today is the 10th anniversary of Max Verstappen’s first Formula 1 win, and Luke Smith put together an excellent oral history of it that I think is very much worth your time. I forgot just how little prep time Verstappen had before his first race. It wasn’t the buildup you’d expect from a moment that launched such an incredible run of success. All the quotes in Luke’s piece — from Verstappen himself to his race engineer, GianPiero Lambiase, to Dutch commentator Olav Mol — are so good. Two details from the piece stuck with me though: Give it a read here! If only to admire the amazing lead image our art team cooked up. Formula 1 goes to Canada next weekend, and if you were waiting for a circuit that will actually tell you something more about these cars, congratulations. You’ve made it. Circuit Gilles Villeneuve is not a complicated track. It’s a man-made island in the St. Lawrence River, which runs through Montreal, and the circuit itself is basically: There’s a hairpin. A couple of chicanes. There are long straights that punish you if your car is slow in a straight line. It’s a lovely, by-the-book track. This makes it a fascinating stress test for a set of regulations that, five rounds in, still have more questions than answers. Oscar Piastri said in Miami that you can’t actually fix the fundamental problems with these cars without changing the hardware. Any major fixes will need to come next season. He’s right — and some are coming, as we’ll get into in a moment. But Montreal will at least show you which teams have figured out how to work within the constraints and which ones are still arguing with them. Isack Hadjar said in Miami that he thought some tracks would be harder on the power units than others. Montreal is one of those tracks. Let’s throw it to Luke in the paddock. The thorny issue of multi-team ownership is again in the F1 spotlight amid Mercedes’ interest in purchasing a stake in Alpine. McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown took a fresh step in the matter this week when he sent a letter to the FIA president, Mohammed Ben Sulayem, expressing his concerns over the topic. In the letter, a copy of which has been obtained by The Athletic, Brown said companies having stakes in multiple F1 teams “need to be addressed as a matter of priority,” before going on to cite the competitive advantages it can bring — and the cost to rivals. Brown has a point. Last month, Red Bull announced its new head of performance, Andrea Landi, would join from Racing Bulls — also owned by Red Bull — effective in July. Other teams often have to wait months, even years, for staff to complete gardening leave. It’s understandable why Brown is speaking up now, given Mercedes’ links to the Alpine shares that are up for sale. But this isn’t an anti-Mercedes — which supplies McLaren engines — or anti-Toto Wolff move. It’s simply entrenching a long-held position on a matter that Brown feels strongly about. Back when Red Bull bought a second team in 2005, F1 was in a very different place. It needed secure team ownership. Now, it’s a seller’s market — something that only reinforces Brown’s point about the practice of multi-team ownership being outdated and not good for F1. The FIA confirmed this week that its ADUO system (Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities, because the FIA loves gobbledegook) will kick in after Canada. We’ll have much more on this soon, but for now, I thought I should get you up to speed, if you’re not already. The short version: Engine development is frozen at the start of the year. ADUO is the thaw — for whoever earned it. Honda (Aston Martin’s troubled engine provider) almost certainly qualifies for maximum help. Audi, too. Ferrari may sneak in. Red Bull Powertrains is an interesting case. Laurent Mekies said they expected to qualify; Max Verstappen has said their engine is fine, and the chassis is the problem. Fun internal dynamic! ADUO is not a quick fix. Lead times on engine development are very long. But it’s a door. Canada is when it opens. The FIA announced last Friday that F1 engines will, “in principle,” change for 2027. As Alex Kalinauckas noted this week, those two words are doing a lot of work! The headline: The current near-50-50 split between internal combustion engine (ICE) and electrical power will shift to something closer to 60-40 in favor of ICE. (In recent seasons, it was somewhere around 80-20.) The cars would theoretically be less energy-starved, less prone to superclipping and closer to something drivers would describe as a racing car. The catches: There are several, and Alex gets into them here. The next formal vote could come before the June 23 World Motor Sport Council meeting. Should be a fun Thursday. 🚗 Valtteri Bottas showed up to qualifying at Miami without a paddock pass because someone stole his Cadillac Escalade from the driveway of his Airbnb in Fort Lauderdale overnight. Alex has the full story here. 🏁 Verstappen spent this week making his debut at the Nürburgring 24 Hours, because off weeks are for other people. His co-driver, Dani Juncadella, put the car fourth on the grid for Saturday’s race, eight-tenths off the pole-sitting Lamborghini. Obviously brings to mind Luke’s story on why, and if, Verstappen will leave F1. (Oh, and Verstappen and the 24 Hours was also our most-clicked story last time!) 🔴 I was reading that former Ferrari race engineer Rob Smedley described Ferrari’s situation (how it brought a ton of upgrades to Miami and struggled) as “slightly soul-destroying.” If you missed it, Madeline asked what it will take for Ferrari to catch Mercedes this season. ⛵ Ferrari wants to build an amazing sailboat. That’s stripped of some context … but the gist is compelling, no? 💸 And, finally, our collectibles team took a look at a record-high trading card market, including for one F1 driver. 📫 Love Prime Tire? Check out The Athletic’s other newsletters. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms