18/07/2025 06:30
Martin Brundle believes Christian Horner's decision to try and play
down key departures from Red Bull was a factor behind his sacking.
Horner was dismissed as team principal and CEO of Red Bull on July
9th, after 20 years in charge, and has been replaced by Racing
Bulls boss Laurent Mekies. Since it crushed the F1 field in 2023
with 21 wins from 22 races, Red Bull has been hit with key
departures, with chief technical officer Adrian Newey, sporting
director Jonathan Wheatley, chief designer Rob Marshall, and
strategy chief Will Courtenay all accepting roles elsewhere.
Courtenay actually remains with Red Bull after it refused
permission for him to take up his new position with McLaren, with
his contract to expire in 2026. After those departures, and
especially Newey's, Horner was keen to stress that Red Bull would
be fine to carry on without the key figures, but car and race-team
performance have slumped alarmingly. As such, Brundle has explained
how downplaying the departures was a factor in Horner's own. "He's
been a passenger as well since Bahrain last year when that news
came out and the tail has been wagging the dog a little bit,"
Brundle observed on the Sky Sports F1 podcast, referring to the
investigations by Red Bull GmbH into allegations of inappropriate
behaviour. "Obviously, Team Verstappen have been briefing certain
journalists, and Christian came under more and more pressure.
"He'd lost key people like Adrian Newey, Rob Marshall, and Jonathan
Wheatley, and his failing was convincing himself and trying to
convince everybody else that they weren't really doing that much
anymore, and it didn't matter. "That he'd got a better crew behind
them, but that wasn't correct, and it is not exactly like it has
been a disaster and they're completing non-performing, but there
were too many things working against him. "He had a lot of support
from [Red Bull's majority owner] Chalerm Yoovidhya, and eventually
that faded away, and the inevitable happened."
