Horner under Red Bull pressure amid alarming slump

Strange times at Red Bull. Stats alone suggest Christian Horner is leading them towards a fourth consecutive drivers’ world championship with Max Verstappen, and a third straight constructors’ title.

In short, happy days; but from just about every other metric it seems either all is not quite well. If you want to be a bit more dramatic, it’s just falling apart like an early-season Sergio Perez title charge.

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The team's 2024 appears to be in non-stop crisis, the latest development being Jonathan Wheatley’s shock exit, which started before the F1 campaign had even begun with a civil war that splintered off into multiple angles.

False start to 2024

Horner found himself at the centre of work place allegations of ‘inappropriate behaviour’ that he continues to deny. Whether by coincidence or as a result of the unsettled atmosphere around the team, wave after wave of news off the track have followed which have not reflected well on the team.

Horner stood his ground and held onto his position after an independent internal inquiry over the ‘inappropriate behaviour’ to achieve a major victory in the political structure of Red Bull. But at what cost?

From the outside this Red Bull saga appears to have calmed down, but since the investigation we have already seen the confirmed exit of design guru Adrian Newey, who has been influential to all the team’s success since joining them in 2006.

Thursday brought the shock forthcoming departure of sporting director Wheatley – a move so sudden that the timing of the official announcement even caught his future team by surprise.

Internal Red Bull conflicts

The future of long term stalwarts like Helmut Marko have been under constant scrutiny, and that introduces complications to Red Bull’s relationship with arguably their prime asset in world champion Max Verstappen.

Verstappen is a strong ally of Marko who has not gelled too well with Horner, and to make matters worse the Dutchman’s father Jos appears to have an even worse relationship with the Red Bull team principal given the astonishing public spat over driving a previous team car at an Austrian Grand Prix demo back in July.

Horner and Verstappen Jr.'s relationship is perhaps a bit healthier than the two aforementioned characters, but given how close Max is with his father, there is only one real winner there when it comes to overall influence.

Verstappen has tried to stay out of the war of words as he tries to keep his head towards on-track matters, but the vultures are circling Red Bull now. Among them are Toto Wolff and Mercedes, who will pounce at the slightest opportunity they can find to get the world championship leader into one of their cars as soon as possible. Those Lewis Hamilton shoes are big ones to fill for 2025, and arguably only Verstappen can fill that void.

Having a dominant car has been a recent staple of Red Bull and a key selling point to convince Verstappen to stay, but the early season advantage they enjoyed has all but disappeared. It’s highly arguable that they are not even the quickest team now, behind McLaren, and they are well within shooting distance of Mercedes and Ferrari. They now only have one podium (through the Dutchman, of course) in the last four races.

Building a hefty early season advantage will probably be enough for Verstappen to take the world title again this year, but with Perez’s nightmare struggles to compete at the front in the second car – they are far from certain to clinch the constructors'. The Mexican hasn't recorded a top-six finish in the last eight grands prix.

Which engine is in the Red Bull?

Of course Red Bull are still front runners, but their power units are also about to hit a transitional period when the Honda training wheels come off the in-house PUs and Ford come in for 2026. It only brings more uncertainty. As far as the big teams are concerned, Red Bull may even be the least attractive proposition to join right now.

Behind the veneer of points, there appears to be the fall of an empire built by Horner and it is still uncertain if the team principal, who himself has been a huge part of the team’s success across two decades, is going to stick around long term for one reason or another.

At the very least it’s a team in transition, but who knows what is in store long term? Horner’s focus is carrying this limping F1 behemoth to another title success, but the constant exit of key staff and inner turmoil reflects a growing problem of a team starting a decline.

Perhaps a comparison can be made to McLaren in 1991 when the previously dominating team were caught and then surpassed by Williams in the second half of the season and never really got their mojo back for another seven years.

Either way, the pressure is on Horner to start getting positive vibes coming out of a team that is in a ludicrous position of having hardly any despite leading both championship standings. It’s not sustainable and something will have to give.

READ MORE: Horner reveals exit timeline after shock Red Bull departure confirmation

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