Christian Horner deserves ‘credit’ after 's**ttiest year of his life’

Red Bull F1 principal Christian Horner deserves “credit” for how he handled the “s**ttiest year of his life”, according to Guenther Steiner.

Controversy surrounded Horner before the 2024 season had even begun when a woman accused the 50-year-old Briton of inappropriate and controlling behaviour. Following an investigation, Red Bull’s board dismissed her complaint and Horner was cleared of any wrongdoing.

Horner then had to oversee a particularly difficult campaign for Red Bull amid political infighting, development woes and performance issues on track.

While Red Bull slipped to third place in the constructors’ championship, largely down to Sergio Perez’s woeful displays, Max Verstappen was able to win a fourth successive world title.

And former Haas team principal Steiner believes Horner is deserving of praise for how he handled the difficult situations at Red Bull.

“I think he will remember the ’24 year as [the] pretty s**ttiest year of his life, you know, with all the stuff which happened, and so we have to give to him credit,” Steiner told GPBlog.

“He always stood up for it. We don’t even talk about the beginning of the year, his private stuff, but then going into it, it’s pretty clear, they had that one driver in the team.

“They couldn’t defend the Constructors’ World Championship, because they had only one car.”

“They were fighting a McLaren with two very good drivers. And I’m not saying that Checo [Perez] is not a good driver, but he wasn’t last year. We have to say that one.

“In the past he was a good driver, he won races, but last year, he underperformed. In the end, they were faced with dealing with it, but obviously it was a bad year keeping the team together.”

‘Difficult’ to replace Newey

Red Bull have also been rocked by the departures of several key personnel ahead of the 2025 season, with legendary designer Adrian Newey joining Aston Martin and sporting director Jonathan Wheatley departing to become Sauber’s new team boss.

Steiner says the challenge Red Bull face to find replacements cannot be underestimated.

“Obviously, they lost some people,” he added.

“They lost Adrian [Newey], they lost Jonathan [Wheatley], they’re going to lose the strategy engineer Will Courtenay [to McLaren], which are all very good people.

“And as much as Red Bull has got a good second line, these people are there a long time.

“They know the ins and outs, and sometimes having new blood in is good, but you need something – replacing an Adrian, it will be difficult.

“But only time will tell what Christian can make out of it, but I think it is not getting any easier for him in the moment.”