Max Verstappen Brands New Madrid Circuit a ‘Car Killer’ as F1 Drivers Brace for Its Unforgiving Walls

• Max Verstappen has branded Formula 1’s brand new Madring circuit “probably a car killer” ahead of its debut at this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix.
• George Russell went further, calling it “arguably the most risky circuit of the whole calendar,” pointing to its combination of high-speed corners and walls that leave no room for error.
• A two-day Formula 3 test at the track last month produced 19 red flags, most of them for crashes, fuelling fears of a disruptive weekend in Madrid.

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A circuit built to punish the smallest mistake

Max Verstappen does not think Formula 1’s newest circuit will be kind to the cars racing on it. Speaking as the paddock arrived at the Madring for the first time, the Red Bull driver said the tight, wall-lined layout in the Spanish capital is “probably a car killer,” setting the tone for a Thursday when driver after driver lined up to describe a track unlike anything else on the calendar.

The Madring is a hybrid of street circuit and purpose built track laid out around Madrid’s IFEMA exhibition centre, with 22 corners and top speeds of up to 340kph. It is the 81st different circuit to host a world championship grand prix, and Thursday’s driver media session made clear that none of the 22 drivers arrived with anything close to a full understanding of what the layout would ask of them or their cars.

“It’s a tough track. For me, what I feel while driving, it’s a little bit the same kind of sensation that I get sometimes around Jeddah in places,” Verstappen said. “Of course, Jeddah is faster on average with the corners, but the walls are quite similar in how they are positioned.”

Verstappen: ‘Easy to make a mistake’

Verstappen pointed to last month’s Formula 3 test at the Madring, when a two-day session produced 19 red flags, most of them for crashes in various parts of the lap. “It’s going to be tough,” he said. “I think when F3 were testing here there were a lot of shunts, so it’s not an easy track, easy to make a mistake also with the layout of the track.”

The kerbs at the Madring were also on Verstappen’s mind. “The kerbs that are there, we need to run over a few of them, and that’s normally not the strong point of our car, but we will try to do the best we can,” he said. Asked directly whether the track was a car killer, he added: “It probably is a car killer from what I’ve seen so far but you just need to try and stay out of the walls and try to get the best possible feeling in the car. When you’re confident in the car on a street circuit it helps a lot.”

Sainz: ‘It has character’

Carlos Sainz, who has given input into the circuit’s design, was more measured but still cautious about what to expect once cars hit the track in anger. “Realistically speaking, it’s going to be now tomorrow in FP1 when we really know what this track is all about. And I’m going to say it looks different,” the Williams driver said. “It looks that the track has character, that it’s charismatic, with a lot of different kinds of corners.”

Pierre Gasly, fresh off his shock maiden pole position at Monza last week, was blunter about the scale of the challenge. “The track layout is something I’ve never seen before. You have these crazy corners, blind corners, a huge banking,” the Alpine driver said. “It took me a few laps in the sim to get my head around what’s where. It’s very challenging because everything is twisty. I’m excited. I expect a really hectic weekend with lots of disruption and mistakes and we will have to make sure we are on the right side of it.”

Russell: ‘No margin for error’

Of all the pre-weekend assessments, Russell’s carried the most force given his position at the front of the championship fight. “It’s a crazy circuit. I would put it as arguably the most risky circuit of the whole calendar because you have real high-speed corners, sort of Jeddah-esque. The walls are very close, so there’s no margin for error,” the Mercedes driver said.

“But then you have other corners that are quite like Baku, where you’re coming from a high speed into a slow braking zone, you’re braking and turning at the same time, so locking tyres is going to be easy. And if you lock up, you’ll be straight in the wall.”

Hamilton drew his own comparison, pointing to two very different circuits from opposite ends of the calendar. “There’s probably some similarities with these kerbs compared to somewhere like Montreal where you saw obviously Mercedes was very quick, but there was a lot more straights there as well,” he said. “It’s a massively challenging circuit. Of all the new tracks that I’ve gone to, this one, maybe Saudi, are the two closest in terms of how difficult it was to get on top of the car and find the right lines.”

Why qualifying will decide so much

None of the drivers who spoke on Thursday had turned a competitive lap at the Madring before. The closest reference point available to the field was last month’s Formula 3 test, and even that only told part of the story: F3 cars carry less downforce and far less speed than the machines that will take to the track in Friday’s opening practice session. Every driver quoted on Thursday was, in effect, describing a circuit they had only experienced through simulator work and a handful of onboard laps filmed by F1 itself.

The warnings carry real consequences beyond Friday and Saturday practice. Most corners at the Madring have only one realistic racing line, which is expected to make overtaking difficult once the race gets underway on Sunday and puts a premium on grid position. That makes qualifying, and staying out of the walls Verstappen and Russell both flagged, unusually important for a circuit hosting its first grand prix.

The stakes are highest for the four drivers at the top of the championship. Kimi Antonelli arrives in Madrid leading Russell by 66 points, Hamilton by 76 and Lando Norris by 96 after his victory from 19th on the grid at Monza last Sunday. For all four, a single mistake on a circuit several of their peers have already labelled the most dangerous of the season carries a cost far beyond a damaged car.

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Written by

Jack Renn

Jack Renn is an editor at F1 Chronicle and a veteran motorsport journalist with 25 years of experience covering Formula 1 and international motorsport. A member of the Association Internationale de la Presse Sportive (AIPS), the global body representing accredited sports journalists, Jack has spent his career reporting from paddocks and press rooms across the F1 calendar. His work spans race analysis, technical insight, and in-depth features, giving readers authoritative coverage grounded in decades of firsthand experience at the highest level of the sport.

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