Max Verstappen must avoid critical mistake to trump Lewis Hamilton and Michael Schumacher | F1 | Sport

Johnny Herbert has warned Max Verstappen that he must avoid the mistakes made by his close friend and F1 rival, Fernando Alonso, if he is to eclipse Lewis Hamilton and Michael Schumacher by becoming the sport’s first-ever eight-time world champion.

Despite being the most experienced driver in F1 history and regarded among the sport’s all-time greats, Alonso has just two World Championships to his name, and has not won a Grand Prix for over a decade. The former Renault and Ferrari star is still performing at an elite level at 44. Still, he has been unable to find a team capable of providing him with title-worthy machinery.

Verstappen, meanwhile, boasts four Drivers’ Championship crowns to his name at the age of 28, and is in the prime of his career. In 2025, he decided against swapping Red Bull for Mercedes, opting to survey the pecking order in 2026 after the new technical regulations took effect.

With question marks surrounding Red Bull’s competitiveness for 2026 after a number of key departures and ahead of the debut of the team’s in-house power units, Verstappen will face a critical decision about his future in the coming months.

“There is definitely a chance for Max Verstappen to win the record-breaking eighth world championship,” Herbert told JeffBet. “I do think Lewis Hamilton should have done that, but it hasn’t happened, and I don’t think it will happen at Ferrari.

“Verstappen can win even more than eight, but he needs the right equipment to do that. With all the technology coming into 2026, it may not be Max’s year. Another team could become dominant, and then Max could be stuck at four.

“A prime example of someone who should have won more championships is Fernando Alonso, but he did a lot of moving around, and he was never in the right place.

“It just proves that even if he is one of the best drivers Formula One has ever seen, Alonso only has two and he could have won more. You just need that luck to be in the right place at the right time. Sometimes you have to engineer that luck by yourself. Max made a decision not to go to Mercedes for 2026.

“If George Russell or Kimi Antonelli wins the world championship, then it will be very hard for Toto Wolff to let either of them go, even if Max is free. Wolff might not want to rock the boat by bringing in Max; he won’t want another Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton partnership again.”