The rift between Christian Horner and Jos Verstappen reared its head on Friday in Austria over the latter’s participation in a track parade.

Verstappen Snr was scheduled to drive an older-spec Red Bull F1 car in a demonstration set up by the Austrian drinks company’s head office.

That came as news to Horner, who requested further information about the outing.

A war of words then broke out between the pair as they made comments through the media.

“Of course, it’s not nice, I think; not my myself, not for my dad, not for Christian, nor for the team,” admitted Max Verstappen, who appears to be caught in the middle of the saga.

“You don’t want these things to happen.

“My dad has been quite clear about the reason behind it and of course I can understand his opinion on that.

“At the end of the day, he gets asked to drive the car, finds out that he’s not wanted to drive the car.

“Well, my dad, actually he doesn’t care about driving the car, but he got asked and said ‘please do it for the fans, Dutch fans, blah, blah, blah.

“Red Bull, we have a great relationship with, home track, so I understand,” he added.

“I’m here of course to focus on the performance side of things.

“I want a good relationship with everyone but of course this scenario could have been avoided.”

Verstappen’s performance was unaffected by the drama within the camp, taking pole for the F1 Sprint and securing the 100km victory before taking pole for the Austrian Grand Prix.