One charity is set to become $250,000 richer should anyone other than Max Verstappen win the F1 2024 World Championship.
Formula 1 very much finds itself in the Verstappen era, the dominant Dutchman having now reeled off three World Championship successes in a row, with his latest triumph involving a record-breaking 19 grands prix wins on his way to capturing the 2023 crown.
Understandably, Verstappen is the overwhelming favourite among his peers to become a four-time World Champion in F1 2024, though for charities around the world, they will be hoping that he does not pull this off.
That is because Jeff Dodds, CEO of the all-electric Formula E series, has promised to donate $250,000 to the chosen charity of a driver that beats Verstappen to the crown.
Formula E is broadcast on TNT Sports in the UK and Ireland, and during an interview with the broadcaster, Dodds declared of Verstappen’s title chances: “99 per cent he gets that trophy.
“I’ll tell you what, so if he doesn’t win it, there are 19 other drivers, if any one of the other 19 drivers win it, we’ll give a quarter of a million dollars to the charity of choice of the driver that does win it.
“It wouldn’t be the worst day in the office to give a load of money to charity, but absolutely, he is nailed on to win that season.”
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Verstappen has been playing it cool when it comes to addressing Red Bull’s perceived advantage heading into the new season.
However, he gave little hope to pursuing rivals by confirming that the RB20 is “for sure” an improvement on the RB19, meaning that $250k may well be staying in Formula E’s bank account.
“If it would have been worse then we did a very bad job, so I know for sure the car is better than last year’s car,” Verstappen told media including PlanetF1.com’s Thomas Maher in Bahrain with a laugh, before adding: “But I think everyone on the grid has a better car than last year.”
The Red Bull concept which has dominated F1’s ground effect era so far has served as inspiration to many teams looking to bridge the gap when designing their challengers, but Red Bull has made a surprise dart down another avenue for F1 2024, producing a new-look RB20 which is truly unique compared to its competition.
To change course is a major risk taken by Red Bull, though Verstappen has full trust in his team.
“The team believes that, with how the car is at the moment, that there is more potential to find, I guess, so that’s now up to us to unlock,” he said.
“I trust the team to be honest, that they make the right decisions in terms of choosing the direction of the car.
“I saw how it was already a bit drawn [at the] end of the last year, but obviously I don’t care how the car looks like as long as it’s fast.
“Also, when I saw it for the first time fully built together, whatever shape it has, I sit in the car and once you drive out, you feel quite quickly if it feels quite normal or not.
“Unfortunately, our filming day was only wet so you don’t really know anything but as soon as I jumped in here, it felt pretty normal.
“Yeah, it looks a bit different, but it’s the direction that the team chose and I believe that that’s the best direction to go into if they say so and then, from my side now, it’s all about just giving my feedback about [the] balance of the car, what I think can be improved. but that’s an ongoing process with the car.”
With 24 rounds scheduled in F1 2024, Verstappen will hope to improve on his already insane, record-breaking 19 grands prix wins in 2023, which included a 10-race winning streak, also a new F1 benchmark
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