F1 steward Johnny Herbert has revealed what Max Verstappen is like in the stewards’ room in the wake of suggestions in the Dutch press that he is biased against him.
On-duty steward Herbert was put in the crosshairs after the Mexican GP with Jos Verstappen suggesting the FIA needed more neutral voices on the panel.
Johnny Herbert details steward rooms talks with Max Verstappen
Herbert was one of the four in the stewards’ room for Mexico and ultimately played a part in Verstappen receiving 20 seconds worth of penalty.
After the race, Jos Verstappen went on the offensive and suggested “the FIA should take a good look at the staffing of the stewards, who they put there and whether there is no appearance of a conflict of interest.”
De Telegraaf then claimed that Jos Verstappen was believed to be referring to Herbert, and Tim Mayer, the son of the late McLaren co-founder Teddy Mayer.
Herbert and Mayer made up half of the four-man FIA stewards’ panel over the Mexican Grand Prix weekend, with Loic Bacquelaine and Alfonso Oros Trigueros also on duty.
Herbert though was full of praise for Max Verstappen, praising him for his ‘what you see is what you get’ approach.
“That’s Max,” Herbert exclusively told PlanetF1.com. “If he was here today, you’d have a bloody good chat with him.
“He’s very worldly. He’s very open to chat about anything and you have a really nice conversation with him. So he was very understanding.
“He did his outside press conference himself [in Singapore] and everything else but that’s good, because that’s part of the character, and the character is something we don’t want to lose.”
Herbert had a previous meeting with Verstappen when he was summoned for swearing in the FIA press conference. Herbert did not pass judgement of the rule itself but denied claims that clamping down on things like that would make the sport more robotic.
“Using one word in that whole press conference, would it have made any difference if he didn’t use it? Well, yes, it would have made a big difference,” Herbert said. “Would it have made any difference to his character? And what he was saying? No, it wouldn’t have made any difference.
“So this robotic thing, I don’t know why people thought that was going to be the case.
“But I enjoy it because when we get those situations, they’re not easy, they’re not hard. There’s four of us in a room, we all have to sort of try and agree with what we do. We have slightly different opinions. But then eventually we come together.”