McLaren team boss Zak Brown has revealed the door is "wide open" for Max Verstappen to join the team, after holding talks with the Dutchman over the summer. Brown described Verstappen as "charming" and said he would "love to work with him someday."
Brown opens up on Verstappen talks
Speaking about his conversations with the Red Bull driver, Brown said: "I spoke to Max a few times last summer, just because I wanted to get to know him better. If I could use one word to describe him right now, it would be a word that hadn't occurred to me before those conversations: charming. I bet no one who doesn't know him well would characterise him that way. But I am genuinely impressed by him. A racer through and through."
All talks between McLaren and Verstappen's camp were exploratory. Lando Norris signed a new £30m-per-year contract until 2030 in August, while Oscar Piastri also has a deal for the next two seasons after the current one.
Door 'wide open' for future move
Despite being satisfied with his current line-up, Brown admitted Verstappen remains on his mind. He added: "I'm really happy and satisfied with my current line-up, but I was much more impressed by him as an individual than I had expected. I can really race with this guy, because I hate racing against him. The door is still wide open for Max, for 2028, 2029, or any year, for that matter. I enjoyed getting to know him better and would love to work with him someday."
Verstappen penned a new Red Bull contract last month, but he still has exit clauses that McLaren could encourage him to use next year.
Verstappen's qualifying struggles in Baku
Verstappen remains winless so far this season and is at risk of going an entire season without a victory for the first time since 2015, his debut year on the grid as a teenager when he was driving for Toro Rosso. He is highly unlikely to end that barren run in Baku on Saturday, after qualifying just eighth.
He was hampered on his final run by yellow flags caused by Norris, who misjudged a corner and took the run-off. However, speaking afterwards, Verstappen made it clear the yellows were the least of his problems. He fumed: "The engine just wasn't working for the whole of qualifying.
"We'd made one change to the car and that didn't really pay off either. But yeah, the car wasn't working. Compared to my team-mate I was already half a second down on the straights. You want to push on for the middle sector and suddenly the battery wasn't full. It's not charging, it's not working. And then they tell me I need to push with half a battery. I thought, 'Just p*** off. I was completely done with it for a moment.
"You prepare so well all weekend, the car is working well. Then it all falls apart in qualifying and you can't do anything with it anymore. After that aborted lap because the battery was half full, the tyre pressure also cooled down too much. You can't push because it's not working, so you can't get enough temperature into the tyres.
"So in the last lap as well I just didn't have the right grip, plus the same problem with the engine not working. The engine braking was also strange, sometimes it felt like you were pulling the handbrake in certain corners. Something is seriously wrong. They need to look into whether it can be solved with this engine."
