A Quote by Max Verstappen

My first memory of motor racing - I think it was just attending a go kart race. — © Max Verstappen
My first memory of motor racing - I think it was just attending a go kart race.
It was when I first tried a go-kart in '96. I saw a go-kart race locally, and that got me excited about it, and I wanted to try one. When I got to try one, I just loved the speed and after that it became more about how to improve the lap time and all the details and that.
I was fascinated by racing as a kid, but no way would I have thought I'd make it into Formula One from here, from being from Perth, racing on little local go-kart tracks, you know.
I started racing go karts when I was six. I just loved everything about racing. I was raised in a racing family. And I always wanted to race for a living at the highest level I could.
As a kid, I loved my Matchbox cars, my Big Wheels, and the race cars on TV. When I laid eyes on my first go-kart when I was just five, it gave my desire for making things with wheels go fast a focus. This combined with the fact that I've been incredibly competitive since a young age made for the proper mix of passion and aggression to become a race car driver.
Since I started in motor racing I've worked with people from all over the world. We are all here to go racing and prejudice will never play any part in that.
In my city of Maracay, there is a go kart circuit about five minutes from my home. When I was about three or four years old, I said I wanted to race, but I was too young; then, when I reached the age of seven, my father gave me a kart and we started from there.
There are many different types of prioritites in Motor Racing, the first...being how much you are willing to sacrifice in order to get to where you want to go.
When a sport comes down to physical power, then it definitely needs to be split between men and women, but motor racing is a little bit like horse riding where we fight with the same tools. I believe that motor racing is a sport where women can take on men.
This is motor racing. We go at very high speeds, and tires have always been deflating or exploding. It is just part of the sport.
I looked at motor racing in America where at the Indy 500 the drivers are told 'gentlemen start your engines' and the crowd go wild because they know the race is about to start. I needed a hook and came up with 'let's get ready to rumble.'
I think I was five when I had my real first go-kart.
I like getting together with friends and just making fun of ourselves and stupid things I've done or I've seen them do - and good races we've had together. When I go home to California, I always talk to my go-kart friends about when we were racing at Red Bluff or Cycleland.
I'm good at separating my personal life from racing. When I'm at track, it's race time; when I'm away from it, other than the fact I'm training to be fit for it, there is nothing at home that makes me even want to think about racing. I just want to enjoy my life, and by the time the next race comes around, I'm ready and excited for it.
You might not think that's cricket, and it's not, it's motor racing.
I will do something, time to time, with motor racing. But I'll never go back, I think, to drive full-time because I've lost that anger, that desire.
The biggest thing is getting the kid in a kart - they have to buy it and that's the biggest thing. You can go to a sporting store and buy a basketball for 30 bucks or a football for 30 bucks. You go buy a go-kart and that's 300 bucks. What are you going to get? A basketball or a go-kart?
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