Max Verstappen has rated Gabriel Bortoleto and Kimi Antonelli above all the 2025 F1 rookies, insisting they are the duo with the most “raw talent.”<\/p>\n
Verstappen acted as a role model for the rookies last season and was often seen interacting with Bortoleto and Antonelli in particular.<\/p>\n
The four-time world champion already had small relationships with many of the rookies ahead of their debuts, having interacted with them while racing on simulators.<\/p>\n
Many of the rookies reached out to Verstappen for advice last season, something the Dutchman was more than happy to provide.<\/p>\n
Addressing himself having no issue handing out advice to rookie drivers, Verstappen told Viaplay: “No, not really. It’s also not that I necessarily asked for that.<\/p>\n
“But that just goes very naturally now. Those guys also come a bit from the sim world. You know each other a bit from that. Then you already have a bit more of a connection.<\/p>\n
“Of course they are a lot younger than me, but they are just really nice. Then I’m not going to be blunt. They’re just super nice guys, and I just get along with that.”<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\tWho was the most impressive rookie?<\/p>\n
It was an impressive season for all the rookies, with Verstappen’s new team-mate Isack Hadjar and Antonelli having both made an appearance on the podium.\u00a0<\/p>\n
However, with each having very different cars, picking one as the most impressive is too difficult a task.<\/p>\n
Asked which rookie impressed him the most, Verstappen said: “That’s hard to say. They have all impressed at certain times.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“And again, as rookies, they made their mistakes. That’s typical for a rookie. So nobody was completely consistent, but you shouldn’t expect that from a rookie either.”<\/p>\n
While Verstappen failed to answer which rookie impressed him the most, he did have an answer for who he believes is the quickest.<\/p>\n
“I think Bortoleto along with Kimi are really the raw talents in terms of potential,” Verstappen pointed out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Max Verstappen has rated Gabriel Bortoleto and Kimi Antonelli above all the 2025 F1 rookies, insisting they are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":390260,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,827,817,830,828,831,829,826,813,816,823,825,824,822,85],"class_list":["post-390259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-daniel-ricciardo","tag-f1","tag-f1-calendar","tag-f1-live","tag-f1-results","tag-f1-standings","tag-ferrari","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-max-verstappen","tag-motorsport","tag-racing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}