Red Bull announced on Wednesday morning that it is parting ways with Christian Horner. After twenty years of loyal service, the team boss was immediately dismissed. His departure follows administrative unrest and a lack of competitiveness at the Austrian racing stable. Moreover, many key figures within the Red Bull ranks had already chosen to leave. Here’s an overview of the exodus at the top of Red Bull.
Christian Horner
Twenty years after he took up the role of team boss at Red Bull, the team announced that Christian Horner would leave immediately. The British executive has been under increasing pressure in recent months. The team’s sporting performance this season has been disappointing, and Max Verstappen is seeing his fifth consecutive world title slip through his fingers. At the same time, there has been ongoing turmoil behind the scenes, with tensions within the management and persistent criticism of the team’s direction. Not to mention the scandal that gripped the paddock last year – a female employee accused Horner of inappropriate behavior, although he was later acquitted.
After the recent British Grand Prix – where the team, thanks to Verstappen’s fifth place, only garnered ten championship points – a meeting took place between shareholders Mark Mateschitz, Chalerm Yoovidhya, and sporting director Oliver Mintzlaff. They decided to take decisive action and immediately suspended Horner.
Adrian Newey’s Departure
Just as Max Verstappen was making a dominant start to the 2024 season, Technical Director Adrian Newey announced before the Miami Grand Prix that he would be leaving the team. In his lengthy Formula 1 career, the celebrated designer has won numerous championships, primarily with Red Bull in recent years. He joined the team in 2006, quickly delivering championship-worthy designs. Under Sebastian Vettel, his cars brought the team four constructors’ titles and four drivers’ world titles.
With the arrival of Max Verstappen and Honda engines, new successes followed in recent years. With the RB19, Newey effectively designed the most competitive Formula 1 car ever; Red Bull won an impressive 21 out of 22 Grand Prix in 2023. However, despite all this success, Newey seemed disillusioned by the hustle and bustle of the sport. He expressed a desire to ‘take a step back’. After a few months of retirement, he began to miss the challenge and competitiveness of Formula 1. Three months after leaving Red Bull, he announced his return to Aston Martin.
Jonathan Wheatley’s Transition
In August 2024, three months after Adrian Newey announced his departure from Red Bull, Sporting Director Jonathan Wheatley followed suit. At the end of the previous year, he bid farewell to the team to make his debut as team boss of Sauber this year. He had joined Red Bull early on as a team manager and later became one of the key figures behind the success of the racing stable. However, the challenge at Audi’s new factory team beckoned. The German car manufacturer announced in August 2022 that it wanted to participate in Formula 1 by taking over the current Sauber team. As Wheatley could not further advance at Red Bull, he chose a new employer.
Will Courtenay
Shortly after the Singapore Grand Prix in 2024, Red Bull announced that chief strategist Will Courtenay would be leaving the team to join McLaren, where he would take on the role of Sporting Director. Courtenay is a familiar face in Milton Keynes; he started in 2005 with the struggling Jaguar team and stayed on after the takeover by Red Bull. In the years that followed, he worked his way up from strategy engineer to senior analyst, eventually reaching the top of the strategic department in 2010.
Although his move to McLaren has been confirmed, Courtenay will likely have to wait a while before he can actually start working in Woking. Red Bull stated that he will ‘remain part of our team until mid-2026’. It’s possible that he will first have to go through a period of gardening leave, which would mean that his work at McLaren would not start until 2027.
Rob Marshall
Finally, Red Bull is also missing former top engineer Rob Marshall, who also made the switch to McLaren in 2024. Marshall worked for the Austrian racing team for seventeen years and thus played a significant role in the earlier successes with Sebastian Vettel. The current rise of McLaren is partly attributed to his designs. For instance, the discovery that allowed the papayas to better cool their tires – according to experts, the major advantage of the MCL39 – is said to have been an invention of Marshall’s.
