Max Verstappen, Francesco Bagnaia and Red Bull have been nominated for the prestigious Laureus World Sports Awards for 2023.
Having won the 2022 World Sportsman of the Year, Red Bull’s Verstappen has been nominated once again in the category for 2023 Laureus World Sports Awards after winning the 2022 F1 drivers’ world championship – his second on the bounce.
Te Dutchman only became the fourth driver to have the prestigious award last year after Michael Schumacher, Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel. Should he win this year, he will join Schumacher in becoming only the second F1 driver to have won more than once.
Verstappen has stiff competition from Kylan Mbappe & Lionel Messi (Football), Mondo Duplantis (Sweden), Rafael Nadal (Tennis) and Stephen Curry (Basketball). The Dutchman’s team Red Bull has been nominated for World Team of the Year.
Having had a dominating run, Red Bull ended the Mercedes domination in 2022 in the V6 Hybrid era together with Honda by winning the constructors’ title. It will be first for them if it wins the award, joining Renault, Brawn GP and Mercedes in the process.
In terms of competition, Red Bull is up against Argentina Men’s, Real Madrid & England Women’s (Football), France Men’s (Rugby) and Golden State Warriors (Basketball). While F1 has two nominations, MotoGP has one courtesy Ducati’s Bagnaia.
The 2022 MotoGP champion Bagnaia has been nominated under Comeback of the Year after the Italian fought his way back into the title picture to win it against Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo. It is his first nomination in Laureus but has stiff competition.
He is up against the likes of Annemiek van Vleuten (Cycling), Christian Eriksen (Football), Jakob Ingebrigtsen (Athletics), Klay Thompson (Basketball) and Tiger Woods (Golf). Here’s full list of Laureus 2023 nominations: https://www.laureus.com/World-Sports-Awards/2023
Here’s list of winners: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laureus_World_Sports_Awards
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