Red Bull made Max Verstappen promise to stop him joining Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes

Red Bull chief Helmut Marko has opened up on how the team convinced Max Verstappen to snub Mercedes during his time as a rookie. The Dutchman recently won the F1 title, beating Lewis Hamilton to the prize on the final lap of the season in Abu Dhabi. However, the two enemies could actually have ended up as allies.

Verstappen rocked Hamilton when he won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in controversial circumstances in December.

It was a frantic end to a wild season where the two drivers had often clashed both on and off the grid.

In the aftermath, there was talk of Hamilton retiring. However, the Mercedes star is now expected to challenge Verstappen for glory this time around having announced he was 'back', while he also visited the Silver Arrows' factory in London.

Now, in a new book 'Formula Max', Red Bull chief Marko has opened up on how the team were able to prevent Verstappen from joining Mercedes when he was younger.

And he's stated that a promise of being in the F1 team straight away was key to winning the race for his signature.

He said: "Of course, we knew that Max's entourage was also talking to Mercedes.

"But with them you wouldn't have gotten to Formula 1 so quickly."

"They wouldn't have dared to put a rookie behind the wheel so soon.

"And my plan was simple: sign a contract and immediately give him a seat in F1.

"In many ways, that was what allowed us to take him away from Mercedes.

"We were seeing that Max I was already prepared for the highest category of motorsport, and that's how it was.

"I would say that, in general, we are very different from Mercedes in the way we approach things.

"We are much closer to the idea of 'no risk, no victory'."

Marko said at the end of January that he's confident Verstappen will