@macleod
Excuse me???????
Rembrandt van Rijn vs van Vincent van Gogh?
And which one of the two just worked hard and had no talent, in your opinion?

What you say is correct, in my opinion, but the comparison makes no sense at all.

I am afraid to disagree with you, for example while my drawings are good (which proof my family by saying that i had talent for drawing) a childhood friend of mine who went to the academic of art was always beter in drawing then me while i was praticing all the time he did other things and still he was beter then me so i went doing technical things and he to the academic of arts.

So the mystic talent does excist but someone with natural talent WHO does pratice hard Always is beter then someone who pratice hard but miss that spark (he could produce still nice things but compared with the one with natural talent (who also works hard) is like Rembrand vs van Gogh

That may be, but karting isn't free. A day's karting can cost minimum 150 quid. That's just entry, fuel and travel. That's not including the kart and tyres. I am just talking testing here, the bare minimum.

I see a LOT of parents sinking tens of thousands (sometimes hundreds of thousands) into their kid's racing because the kid simply didn't say "20 laps is fine can we go home". Taken at face value that demonstrates supreme self confidence at a young age for Victoria.

If there is something worse for a kid not getting a chance who wanted it, is a kid getting a chance who didn't want it.

Jos had to make a decision and by the sounds of it he gave Victoria an opportunity and she didn't want it.

Her mother was a top-level kart driver too so didn’t have to look far for a role model.

I know and it's well possible. However, the dynamic Max describes isn't about her saying "not for me" but about his dad (and Max) saying not wanting it "enough". Like I said, that's more complicated.

+1 from another old musician. Agree 100%.

That quote in its full context

“There were a few instances where my dad would spend two days preparing everything like he would do with me, making sure everything was perfect for her to drive. Then she would drive for like 20 laps, and then she’s like ‘that’s it for me for today’. And then my dad would get quite annoyed.”

Her mother was a top-level kart driver too so didn't have to look far for a role model.

That quote is someone, who despite had everything there, had the self-confidence to say "not for me".

Yes, the best of all have both of those, plus one more thing further. Irreverence to constraints, but with respect for what came before.

EVH and Max are (were) similar animals. Blurring the lines in sim and real life technique is not really all that much mentally different than blurring Holdsworth with Clapton.

Miane, by saying 'people like you', without even knowing @drmouse, you're making a very similar judgement, actually.
I don't always agree with drmouse - actually none of us here constantly agree with one another - , but this is not a fair comment regarding drmouse.
It's difficult, and I certainly make mistakes here too, but shouldn't we try to stick to the contents and just comment on that?

As a fellow musician for 35 years, I agree 100%. Talent is a real thing but you have to apply the work for that talent to unfold. This doesn't happen by itself. Without talent you can learn to play the notes but the music isn't there.

Why people like you use so much of your time and thinking to judge the life of others? Who you think you're to judge his family? Have you been there with them all the time? Oh no, you did read it anywhere and thinks you're completely capable of emitting your fair judgement.

Agree, talent matters to an extent and I think verstappen had a lot of natural one, but also true you don't go anywhere if you don't try hard enough with it; another environment where people think it's all about talent is chess, and again there's surely a part in that, but trying to improve and experience play a big part too, with some people having played 400.000 games or something like that and the more casual players a few hundreds and beginners 10-20.

My dad was, anyway, mainly focussed on me. But then if you really want it, if you really want to fight for it, even when let’s say your dad is not really focussed on you, if you make him realise, make him see that ‘I want to do this as well’ – I was 100% sure that my dad would have gone all the way for her as well. But my dad didn’t feel it, she didn’t want it enough.

That's a complicated and self-fulfilling dynamic. Which came first: his sister realizing their dad was focused on her brother (male child) as a driver, or their dad not 'feeling' that she (female child) wanted to become a driver 'enough'?

I think you are reading more than is said.
We know -thankfully- nothing much about the Verstappen family situation apart from the juicy things that make it to the press, and we do not know to what extent Jos was supportive of Victoria's wishes or passions.

goes to show that there’s no mythical “talent” that makes you the best at things

The word 'talent' is also applied in the (insanely competitive) world of musicians, a world I spent many years in.
An internal clock, sense of rythm, a fabulous hearing of tone, intervals and timbre, outstanding locomotion, a quick mind; these are all aspects, but certainly not all of them, that make up 'talent'.
Some musicians have a certain 'je ne sais quoi' that makes them great. Because of the "I don't know what", that makes it hard to explain and describe, but the words 'magic talent' come close.
Believe me, without talent, a musician can put in 24hrs of practice for 365 days a year and many years in a row, and still never get anywhere all the same.
The other way round, a massive amount of talent and no practice at all, gets you at that exact same location; nowhere.

Fortunately, most people without talent are wise enough to not try and waste serious effort on it.

Unfortunately, some not recognising they are without talent still seriously try - and end up sour because the effort they put in doesn't bring them the success others get with that same amount of effort.

Then there's the occasional musician that has the talent and the dedication, and those are unbeatable and go down in history.

The lengths [Jos] went to prepare his young son for the rigours of F1 have been widely reported and even drawn some criticism.

WRT the linked story, I don't think that was Jos trying to prepare his son, it was Jos losing his temper and abandoning his son in anger.

And even if it was a calculated action to attempt to prepare Max for F1, that's even worse. It's not an action which will prepare a child for anything except being abandoned by those they trust.

My dad was, anyway, mainly focussed on me. But then if you really want it, if you really want to fight for it, even when let’s say your dad is not really focussed on you, if you make him realise, make him see that ‘I want to do this as well’ – I was 100% sure that my dad would have gone all the way for her as well. But my dad didn’t feel it, she didn’t want it enough.

This one example shows what many have to go through, though. Even if she had wanted to progress to the top levels of motorsport, she was already at a disadvantage because Jos was focussing on his son's racing, not his daughter's. Of course, if she wanted to, she would have fought for it, but she would have had to fight harder than Max did. Even with equal talent, the road would have been harder for her than for Max purely from the family dynamic, before we even get to the opinions and attitudes of everyone else.

Saying "If they want it, they'll fight for it" is actually an acknowledgement that it is more difficult for a person/group.

I think it mostly goes to show that there's no mythical "talent" that makes you the best at things. Sure, there are perhaps some genetics that make you predisposed to be better at certain tasks (or worse), like eye-hand-coordination. But when people talk about Max having so much "raw talent" I always shake my head because it sounds to me like all you're doing by saying it like that is diminishing the amount of effort it must've taken him to get to that level and stay there. He didn't just wake up a multiple F1 champion one day, after all. Neither did Hamilton or Schumacher or any of them.

Same goes for many athletes inside and out of motorsport. Most of the top household names have similar stories of dedicating their lives from early youth to their craft, they worked for that stuff.