Christian Horner Pokes Fun At Missed Belgian GP After Abrupt Red Bull Exit
Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content.
Former Red Bull Racing CEO and team principal Christian Horner has been enjoying a different kind of "horse power" during the Belgian Grand Prix. Revealing his plans for race day, Horner shared a story on his Instagram account.
The story is a video of him riding a horse, captioned "Different horse power this Sunday." The weekend marks Red Bull's first race without Horner, who was dropped from the team after the British Grand Prix.
Christian Horner still enjoying some horse power on his first race day without Red Bull 🏇 pic.twitter.com/uMExONNDjT — Autosport (@autosport) July 27, 2025
Racing Bulls team principal Laurent Mekies has been promoted to fill Horner's position at Red Bull, and the Belgian GP marks his first race with the Milton Keynes-based team.
While the reason for Horner's ousting has not been revealed, Red Bull senior advisor Helmut Marko has pointed out that performance concerns led to his exit, and that the decision was taken by the managing director of Red Bull GmbH, Oliver Mintzlaff. Newsweek Sports reported his comments:
Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner in the garage during qualifying ahead of the F1 Grand Prix of Great Britain at Silverstone Circuit on July 5, 2025 in Northampton, United Kingdom.
Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner in the garage during qualifying ahead of the F1 Grand Prix of Great Britain at Silverstone Circuit on July 5, 2025 in Northampton, United Kingdom."The decision was made by Oliver Mintzlaff. We informed Christian Horner of this on Tuesday in London after the Silverstone race, at the same time officially thanking him for these 20 years and for these eight World Championship titles.
"This was the result of various factors, but above all, the performance wasn't quite as good as it could have been.
"Fortunately, we were able to bring Laurent Mekies into the family. His responsibilities will be significantly reduced, with the main focus being on racing."
Max Verstappen revealed that he was informed about the decision to drop Horner a day before the news broke, and hinted that the reason for his exit will be revealed. He said:
"I have a good relationship with them, you know, so I think it's quite normal that they inform some people in the team before it goes out. I think it's a standard practice.
"I gave them my opinion. And I keep that to myself. And if they want to say more about it, they will do. And you will hear about it."
Verstappen also revealed that Horner's exit won't make a difference to his future with Red Bull, referencing the last one and a half years under his leadership, during which the team struggled. He said:
"Now, I think people can have a difference of opinion here and then. And I actually expect that to happen because if everyone always agrees, there is a problem. You need to have difference of opinions. And yeah, that's now something that we work with in a different direction. I'm excited about it.
"Like you said, I don't think it will matter at all for my decision in the future. And yet, the only thing that matters is that we work on the car and make it as fast as we can make it, really. And like I said, the last one and a half years have not been what we want to be. Now we try and be more competitive this year a little bit, but for sure also with the new regulations."
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