{"id":159182,"date":"2025-06-05T03:29:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T03:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/159182\/"},"modified":"2025-06-05T03:29:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T03:29:09","slug":"f1-insider-wants-christian-horner-role-change-after-max-verstappen-blunder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/159182\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 insider wants Christian Horner &#8216;role change&#8217; after Max Verstappen blunder"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>A Formula 1 pundit and former Ferrari general manager has suggested that <a title=\"Christian Horner\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-news\/87455\/christian-horner\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Christian Horner<\/a> should take up a new role within the Red Bull family, following a disastrous Spanish Grand Prix.&#13;<\/b><\/p>\n<p>\nPeter Windsor has suggested that Horner should instead take up a role as sporting director with the Milton Keynes-based outfit, rather than the team principal role that he has held since 2005.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\n<b>F1 HEADLINES:<\/b> <a title=\"Hamilton issues Rachel Brookes apology with Ferrari &#039;love affair in full crisis&#039;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-news\/1051958\/f1-news-today-lewis-hamilton-love-affair-in-full-crisis-as-ferrari-launch-investigation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Hamilton issues Rachel Brookes apology with Ferrari &#8216;love affair in full crisis&#8217;<\/a>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\nJonathan Wheatley held the role as Red Bull&#8217;s sporting director between 2006-2024, but it is unclear whether that position has been directly refilled <b><a title=\"since his departure to become Sauber&#039;s team principal\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-news\/1026860\/red-bull-f1-departure-jonathan-wheatley-audi-team-principal\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">since his departure to become Sauber&#8217;s team principal<\/a><\/b>. &#13;<\/p>\n<p>\nWindsor has suggested that the circumstances that led to Max Verstappen&#8217;s controversial move on George Russell which caused the <b><a title=\"Dutchman to get a 10-second time penalty\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-news\/1051645\/fia-announce-max-verstappen-penalty-verdict-after-controversial-george-russell-incident-at-spanish-grand-prix\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Dutchman to get a 10-second time penalty<\/a><\/b> may not have happened had Wheatley still been in his post.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\nA Red Bull call to pit Verstappen behind the safety car in Spain, despite the fact he only had hard tyres left in his garage, led to frustrations for the 27-year-old, and he eventually let those boil over with the move on Russell.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\n&#8220;Don&#8217;t judge him [Verstappen] too harshly,&#8221; Windsor said in a video on his <a title=\"YouTube\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Yq3p9RdYZXU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">YouTube<\/a> channel. &#8220;He&#8217;s already been punished, and now just celebrate what Max showed in a race car, until Red Bull ruined it with the most ridiculous call in the history of bad strategies. &#13;<\/p>\n<p>\n&#8220;I wonder who made that decision. The engineers also keep an eye on the strategy. Jonathan Wheatley wouldn&#8217;t have let this happen, but maybe Red Bull don&#8217;t have anyone left who can take on that role. &#13;<\/p>\n<p>\n&#8220;If they don&#8217;t have a replacement for Jonathan, then Christian Horner should take on that role.&#8221;&#13;<\/p>\n<p>Horner&#8217;s Red Bull career<\/p>\n<p>\nSince taking over the reins at the energy drinks giant-owned team when they entered F1 in 2005, Horner has won six constructors&#8217; championships and eight drivers&#8217; championships with the team.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\nHe has been the boss of some incredible racing talent, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-drivers\/daniel-ricciardo\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Daniel Ricciardo<\/a>, four-time world champion <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-drivers\/sebastian-vettel\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sebastian Vettel<\/a> and, most recently, Verstappen.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\nWheatley was not the only key member of the Red Bull team to leave in 2024, with design legend <b><a title=\"Adrian Newey\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-news\/1013953\/adrian-newey\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Adrian Newey<\/a><\/b> also deciding to jump ship as the team&#8217;s dominance over the rest of the field began to wane.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\n2024 was also a tumultuous time for Horner, being accused of alleged inappropriate behaviour by a female colleague, allegations he denied and was cleared of by an internal Red Bull investigation.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\nOn top of all that, Red Bull surrendered the constructors&#8217; crown they had claimed in the previous two seasons in 2024, and following a dismal couple of weeks, they now sit fourth in the <b><a title=\"2025 constructors&#039; championship\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-standings\/constructors\/2025\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2025 constructors&#8217; championship<\/a><\/b>.&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\n<b>READ MORE:<\/b> <a title=\"F1 stewards side with Max Verstappen after George Russell incident at Spanish GP\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gpfans.com\/en\/f1-news\/1051704\/f1-stewards-side-with-max-verstappen-after-george-russell-incident-spanish-gp\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">F1 stewards side with Max Verstappen after George Russell incident at Spanish GP<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Related\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Formula 1 pundit and former Ferrari general manager has suggested that Christian Horner should take up a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4103],"tags":[4199,16204,707,4200,4277,12,4276,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-159182","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-f1-news-gossip","10":"tag-formula-1","11":"tag-formula1","12":"tag-gpfans","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-sam-cook","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114628641631673100","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}