'Could have been a lot worse' - Verstappen relieved after huge crash

Max Verstappen had a massive crash when running in seventh on the opening lap of the Dutch Grand Prix; Verstappen walked away unharmed but feels the shunt could have been "a lot worse" at his home event

Max Verstappen admitted his huge crash at the Dutch Grand Prix "could have been a lot worse" after he lost control of his Red Bull on the opening lap of his final home event.

Verstappen caught too much of the damp kerb through the normally flat-out banked corner and hit the outside barriers hard before coming to a halt in front of a packed Zandvoort crowd.

The severity of the incident caused a red flag but Verstappen walked away unharmed from what is likely to be the last Dutch Grand Prix of his career - as the event does not have a contract beyond this year.

"It was of course still quite wet in that corner. As soon as I was going through the corner, I could see a little bit of a dry line coming, and I thought from that point on I could accelerate again, but it suddenly then accelerated a lot," Verstappen explained to Sky Sports F1 .

"It caught me out, simple as that. I tried to correct it but couldn't. And then you hit the wall, but it could have been a lot worse because there were a lot of cars behind me as well, but luckily that all went well."

Sky Sports F1's Nico Rosberg "It's wet, dry, it's a mix of everything. It's incredibly difficult on slick tyres to drive through this high-speed, fast corner. It's the hardest thing in the world. "Max is clearly tighter than everybody else and when you look more closely it looks like the dry patch is offset about 50 centimetres from the inside. "I think he just put a bit too much throttle down and you're gone. He's the greatest driver out there, one of the greatest of all time, that just goes to show how difficult it is in these conditions. "Probably that was Max's mistake."

It was a dramatic end to a disappointing first race after the summer break for Red Bull, just days after Verstappen signed a new contract to stay with the team until at least the end of 2030.

Verstappen started and finish Saturday's Sprint in sixth and was half a second behind pace-setters Mercedes and McLaren in both qualifying sessions.

Having been able to compete at the front in the four races before the summer break, with three podiums in July, it was a surprise to see Red Bull take a step back.

"If you look on average the whole season we have been fourth fastest, I think this weekend really highlighted that," said Verstappen.

"We're a little bit behind, we want to be closer. Maybe [at the next race] in Monza we are, but I don't know.

"We're getting towards the end of the season, you also have to look at next year. I think there are a few things on the car we are looking at that can only be changed next year, to really find a lot more performance."

Red Bull did not bring a major upgrade to Zandvoort, only a new front corner, so team boss Laurent Mekies says they need to understand if their lack of performance was circuit specific, or to do with previous upgrades.