Last Updated on July 9 2025, 4:08 pm

Christian Horner built the mighty Red Bull Racing Formula One team from the ashes of the Jaguar F1 programme. Aged just 31 he took on the role as team principal back in 2005 later recruiting guru car designer Adrian Newey who was disgruntled at McLaren.

In classic Red Bull style seen in other sports where the brand competes, the team was loud and proud as the new kids on the F1 block. Music would regularly blare from their garage in the early days with tunes such as “who let the dogs out” blasting away, as if to announce a revolution in the making.

In five short years Horner took the wreckage of the Ford owned team to compete for titles in 2010, as with Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull wiped the floor with the competition four years in a row. TJ13 has been close to a number of senior Red Bull staff based in Milton Keynes over the years and it has been fascinating the culture that Horner had been able to create.

 

 

 

Horner created a culture of “us v them”

Taking a leaf from Alex Fergusson’s playbook at Manchester United, Horner’s key motivation for his employees to strive for continual improvement was delivered by creating an “us and them” siege type mentality. “It is a shocked campus here at Milton Keynes,“ Sky F1’s reporter Craig Slater observed just two hours after the news first broke of Horner’s departure from Red Bull.

David Croft was standing at the gates of the Milton Keynes campus, as Horner left for the last time at 11:25 in the morning. Two other senior members of the team he reported are also leaving, although its not clear as to whether they were dismissed or left as an act of sympathy for their close associate.

“Staff have been told to make no comments, this is being handled by the Salzberg office. I understand that two other senior management with close connections to Christian Horner have also left their employment here at Red Bull at this time, but in terms of the rank and file here… we have managed to speak to a few off camera and there is significant emotion amongst them,” reports Sky’s Craig Slater.

David Croft concurred with his Sky colleague stating: “From those we have managed to speak to it is a unified sense of disappointment and sadness for a man they see as one who has unified their team. He was never afraid to sit and have a chat to various people no matter what they did for the organisation.

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Staff “gutted” as protest walkout discussed

“The speech Christian Horner gave to the factory was hugely emotional and Christian himself was very emotional and broke down on occasion. He received a massive ovation at the end of that speech from a workforce that are very loyal to him because he has helped bring success and bonuses and world championship glory in terms of 14 world titles during his time as team principal.

Slater added: “One individual said he was ‘gutted’. He’s worked up a down the paddock and there are people he would not work with again – but not Christian Horner.”

TJ13 has learned that conversations amongst the production staff in Milton Keynes have discussed a protest in the form of a walk out, feeling they have been highly let down by the distant Austrian “dictators.” The feeling is those making these decisions have no understanding of the fundamental nature of the operations within the Red Bull team.

Them speculation about Horner’s future has begun already, given the incredible success he brought to what wa in reality a start up team. Ferrari had previously made overtures to the former Red Bull boss, but David Croft believes that may be a bridge too far for Horner to move his young family to Italy.

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Horner’s future back in the F1 paddock

“He looked at Toto Wolff and sees a man that has risen in the same period as Christian Horner has to own a third of a Formula One team. Christian I’m sure will have half an envious eye and think ‘that’s exactly where I should be because ‘I am of that stature’,” Croft told Sky Sports news.

“If that opportunity arises, we’ll definitely see Christian Horner back again. Alpine is the likely candidate for that, but there might be other suitors besides Alpine. Ferrari is a speculation but that might be a bit wide of the mark as well and its probably too soon to jump out of this frying pan and into the bigger fire in Maranello,” added the Sky commentator.

Given the treatment Horner has received at the hands of his Austrian paymasters and the fact he is just 51 years of age, its almost inevitable he will be back in the paddock and sooner rather than later. The Italian media have persistently reported that Ferrari’s Fred Vasseur is coming close to lose his job as team boss in Maranello, calling for a decision to be made quickly as the huge 2026 regulation changes hurtle ever closer.

With the staff under threat of legal action should they speak to the media, the mood in Milton Keynes is not one of resignation but revolution in the aftermath of Horner’s brutal dismissal.

With Laurent Mekies being announced as CEO of there Red Bull Racing programme, there appears to be the possibility another team principal will be appointed beneath him. With Red Bull building their own powertrain for the first time in 2026, Mekies may have oversight of both the team and the powertrains division, whilst a team principal will be announced to manage the day to day operations of the racing team.

 

 

 

Horner sacking. Why now?

It was a regular cloudy British summers day in Northamptonshire, just three days after the biggest F1 event of the season at Silverstone. A mass dump of emails arrived to F1 publications across Europe from the Austrian based Red Bull parent company, announcing the shock sacking of Christian Horner.

The email directed all enquires away from the Red Bull Racing team’s regular PR function in Milton Keynes, to an address associated with the Austrian based energy drinks company. The surprise timing of the announcement, which makes no sense,  together with the clandestine approach by the Austrian directors leaves a whiff of suspicion this was a repeat of the attempted coup in 2024.

Oliver Minztlaff, CEO of the energy drinks empire, was suspected to be behind the breaking news scandal which engulfed Horner last year, but he was then twice cleared of any wrong doing from an independent enquiry run by one of the finest legal minds in UK law…. READ MORE