Did Christian Horner create own ‘downfall’ with ‘Team Verstappen’ strategy?

Christian Horner may have inadvertently set up his own downfall at Red Bull as he created a “one-car team,” and then was set upon by “Team Verstappen.”

That’s according to former F1 driver Karun Chandhok.

That’s what ‘ultimately comes back to bite’ Christian Horner

Red Bull sent shockwaves through Formula 1 when it announced last Wednesday morning that long-serving team boss Horner had been sacked from his role as Red Bull Racing CEO and team principal.

Red Bull has released Christian Horner from his operational duties with effect from today (9 July 2025) and has appointed Laurent Mekies as CEO of Red Bull Racing,” read the statement. It did not disclose the reason for his ousting, nor, according to reports, was Horner told.

It has led to a great deal of speculation, with the most prevalent citing ‘Team Verstappen’ as the reason why Horner was given his marching papers.

A rumour emerged before Horner’s sacking that ‘Team Verstappen’, Max Verstappen, his father Jos, his manager Raymond Vermeulen, and perhaps even Helmut Marko, wanted Horner to have less power and less influence at Red Bull.

A week later, Horner was no longer team principal, with that said to be a move by Red Bull higher-ups to keep the Verstappen camp happy and hopefully put an end to persistent rumours linking him to Mercedes.

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Former F1 driver Chandhok believes Horner paid the price for creating the space that allowed the ‘Team Verstappen’ to take power.

“I think in some of what’s happened, if you look at it in recent years, it’s become a one-car team, right?” he said on Sky F1’s ‘The F1 Show’ podcast.

“We’ve talked about how since Daniel Ricardo left, the way the car design has gone, the way the team has been structured, it’s very much all the eggs in the Max Verstappen camp and in that basket.

“And ultimately that’s kind of created his downfall.

“It’s put a disproportionate amount of power into ‘Team Verstappen’ to the point of which where, if you’re the wider Red Bull group, you look at it and go, ‘hang on a second, yes Max is on pole of the British Grand Prix, yes he’s won two races this year, but the other car’s nowhere’.

“And actually it’s put a huge amount of power in Max’s camp.

“If he leaves that team, they’d be fourth, fifth best on the grid at the moment.

“So I think that has been one of the feelings, and ultimately, Christian’s got to carry the can for that, because he’s the man in charge, he’s led that philosophy of structuring the team in that way.

“Maybe it’s happened by accident, but the reality is he’s the man in charge, and I think there’s a strong element of that is he’s put a lot of power and faith into Team Verstappen.

“And I wonder if that ultimately comes back to bite him a bit.”

Brundle agrees that Red Bull’s second seat has caused problems at Red Bull that have helped shift the intra-team power over to Verstappen.

While the Dutchman has won 60 Grands Prix in the seven years since Daniel Ricciardo left, his five team-mates in that period won a combined total of five.

“They did have a string of great drivers, of course, with DC, Mark Webber, Seb Vettel, Daniel Ricciardo,” he said.

“We’ve also seen a lot of great young drivers who are still on the grid, like [Alex] Albon, [Carlos] Sainz, [Pierre] Gasly, wrecked basically, because Max Verstappen is so unbelievably fast. And I think the problem Christian had is that Max, I mean he had to focus everything on Max, and that that’s hurt the team to an extent.

“I think maybe he had a decent following there. There’s lots of people like GP [Gianpiero Lambiase, Verstappen’s race engineer] and Pedals [Paul Monaghan], as we know him as well, and Rocky [Guillaume Rocquelin], and all sorts of key people who have stayed there in a team of well over 1000 people.

“So I think you won’t know unless you’re really inside the team. I don’t think, I don’t feel capable, able to say that he’d lost the dressing room of the team.

“But there’s no doubt he’s been under a lot of pressure this last 18 months. And I must also mention that his former partner, Beverly, died eight days ago, the mother of his daughter, and he’s been to hell and back in the last few days, Christian. And I think we need to recognise that and remember that.

“But business is business, and they’ve decided to make a change. And you know, we’re talking about Formula 1 teams that spend 300, 400 million pounds a year and recommend a lot of people represent a brand on a global basis. And for whatever reason, they’ve decided that Christian’s not the man to lead them into the next phase, that Laurent Mekies is.

“It’s just odd… This is a strange time to do it, and a strange urgency, I would say. So you know, we don’t know what’s going on behind closed doors, but I do know that Team Verstappen were not happy with him there.”

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