Max Verstappen heads into the F1 2025 season looking to win a fifth consecutive World Championship.

Despite his penalty points tally, Max Verstappen said his approach will not change in the F1 2025 season and will set about “managing the situation”.

He heads into the season with eight points on his FIA Super Licence, the joint-highest of any driver along with Fernando Alonso, with 12 points in a rolling 12-month period being the threshold for a one-race ban.

Max Verstappen responds with little room in FIA penalty points tally

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher and Sam Cooper

While Alonso is due to have three points fall away from his licence on March 24th, which will be after the first double-header of the season, Verstappen will have to navigate 11 Grand Prix weekends before penalty points start to come off his licence, following the Austrian Grand Prix.

Alonso sits in a less perilous position than the Red Bull driver, with six of his eight points set to expire after the first five rounds of the season, but Verstappen has almost half the 2024 campaign with only three penalty points in hand to avoid a race ban – with Kevin Magnussen having become the first to cross the 12-point threshold in September last year.

Verstappen is not set to change the way he goes racing having been in a similar position in the past.

“No, but I’ve been there before,” Verstappen told media including PlanetF1.com when asked if his penalty points tally will affect his racing approach in 2025.

“I think I’ve been on nine or 10 [previously], so it’s all about just managing the situation.”

Verstappen goes into the season either as joint-favourite or second-favourite behind Lando Norris at this stage to become a five-time World Champion, and while the Red Bull driver does not like to pay attention to those particular markets, he added having several teams involved in the fight for victories is “good for the sport” overall.

“I mean, first of all, I don’t like betting, but it’s fine,” he replied.

“We just have to focus on ourselves, like there’s no point to look at others.

“We know that we have things to work on with the car, and that’s what we are doing.”

“I think it’s good for the sport,” he added of multiple teams being in the mix this year. “That’s also, I think, why the rules were set like that.

“So I do hope that it’s exciting and that we get a lot of different winners – teams, as well. That would be great for the sport.”