{"id":698821,"date":"2026-05-28T06:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-28T06:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/698821\/"},"modified":"2026-05-28T06:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T06:56:11","slug":"verstappen-is-a-phenomenon-says-raikkonen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/698821\/","title":{"rendered":"Verstappen is a phenomenon, says R\u00e4ikk\u00f6nen"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former Formula 1 world champion Kimi R\u00e4ikk\u00f6nen has once again praised Max Verstappen, reflecting on the Dutchman\u2019s arrival into Formula 1 during his second spell with Scuderia Ferrari.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cVerstappen! I saw him arrive in F1 during my second stint at Ferrari,\u201d R\u00e4ikk\u00f6nen said, as quoted by\u00a0journalist Leo Turrini, when asked who is currently the strongest driver on the grid.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMax is a phenomenon. He won his first race in Spain right in front of me, ten years ago. There I realised a star was born,\u201d the former F1 driver added.<\/p>\n<p>The 2016 Spanish Grand Prix remains one of the defining moments of modern Formula 1 history. Verstappen won on his debut for Red Bull Racing and became the youngest race winner in F1 history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Formula 1 world champion Kimi R\u00e4ikk\u00f6nen has once again praised Max Verstappen, reflecting on the Dutchman\u2019s arrival&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":698822,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,82],"class_list":["post-698821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=698821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698821\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/698822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=698821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=698821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=698821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}