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Max Verstappen has revealed he does not discuss motorsport with Nelson Piquet whenever he visits the three-time F1 world champion.
Verstappen has been dating Piquet’s daughter Kelly Piquet since January 2021. The Dutchman has followed in the footsteps of his partner’s father, with the Red Bull star having won his third successive world championship last season.
The 26-year-old swept all before him, finishing an enormous 290 points ahead of closest challenger Sergio Perez. Curiously though, Verstappen makes a conscious effort to avoid all discussion of the sport when away from the track.
That is something he also tries to do when visiting his father-in-law over in Brazil. The Dutchman has revealed how he looks to shut out talk of motorsport when enjoying time with his family.
What I do privately is nobody else’s business… I don’t follow that many Formula 1-related accounts or people anyway. I consciously ignore a lot of Formula 1 news, then at some point, it doesn’t pass by in my timeline either,” he told FORMULA 1 Magazine.
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“Actually, I only follow other sports and athletes to get balance in my life that way. I don’t want – and especially when I’m at home – to know everything that’s going on in the paddock. That certainly also applies to family visits in Brazil, when I see my father-in-law [Piquet].
“Then we really don’t talk about motorsport. He has talked more than enough about that in his life. At a certain point, you don’t feel like talking about it anymore either, you’re done talking about it. I do understand that there is more to life.”
Piquet has previously been fined for making racist and homophobic comments towards Verstappen’s rival Lewis Hamilton. Verstappen controversially pipped Hamilton to the world championship in 2021.
In November of that year, Piquet used a Portuguese racial slur in an interview in reference to Hamilton’s crash with Verstappen in the British Grand Prix. Piquet apologised and said his comments had been mistranslated.
In another clip that surfaced later, the Brazilian used racist and homophobic language against Hamilton in a podcast interview when describing how the Mercedes star missed out on the 2016 championship to Nico Rosberg.
Hamilton called for action to change “archaic mindsets” after footage of the first interview surfaced. Charges were then brought in Brazilian courts by four human rights groups, including Brazil’s National LGBT+ Alliance, who wanted him to be fined £1.6million.
In March 2023, a court fined Piquet £780,000 in moral damages for racist and homophobic comments about Hamilton. Judge Pedro Matos de Arruda said the amount of compensation was decided on “so that, as a society, we can some day be free from the pernicious acts that are racism and homophobia”.
