Split Vs Strip In Python To Remove Redundant White Space

May I ask do I need to use strip() before split() to remove any redundant space in Python (and turn into a list after)? For example:

string1 = '   a      b '

I want the result:

#list1=[a,b]

When I test I found out that list1=string1.split() is enough. But somehow my teacher say string1.strip().split() is needed. Maybe he is wrong?

According to the documentation:

If sep is not specified or is None, a different splitting algorithm is applied: runs of consecutive whitespace are regarded as a single separator, and the result will contain no empty strings at the start or end if the string has leading or trailing whitespace.

Which means, that the logic of strip() is already included into split(), so I think, your teacher is wrong. (Notice, that this will change in case if you're using a non-default separator.)