“Rumblings” of Red Bull “friction” before Christian Horner sack revealed

Karun Chandhok has revealed there were “rumblings in the paddock in Austria” about “friction” within Red Bull prior to Christian Horner’s exit.

Horner was sacked from his position as Red Bull team principal with immediate effect on Wednesday in news which sent shockwaves around the F1 world.

The 51-year-old Briton was F1’s longest-serving boss and oversaw all of Red Bull’s victories, as well as six constructors’ world championships and eight drivers’ world titles over two periods of dominance during his 20-year spell in charge of the Milton Keynes-based squad.

Sky Sports pundit and former F1 driver Chandhok has provided some insight into Horner’s sudden departure from Red Bull, suggesting all was not well behind the scenes during the Austrian Grand Prix weekend.

"There were a few rumblings in Austria when we were there over the weekend that there was still that friction that seemed to have been sparked back in Bahrain last year," Chandhok told the Sky Sports F1 podcast.

"Divisions in the camp between, should we say, team Verstappen, and then the Austrian side with Helmut Marko versus the Thailand side, which seemed to back Christian Horner. So this has been building, it feels like, for a while.

"There were rumblings in the paddock in Austria a couple of weeks ago that it was ramping up as these Max Verstappen rumours started to rise again. Would he leave and go to Mercedes? And there's a lot of talk about whether, you know, it was a case of Christian stays or Verstappen stays.

"So I can't say it's been a complete shock but still, fairly seismic news because for all of us who have seen Red Bull over the last 20 years, Christian Horner was Red Bull.

"He was the team principal who was there every session, every single qualifying, every single race day. He was the man who was there.

“But crucially he was never a shareholder or an owner of the team, unlike Toto Wolff and I think that's been a crucial part of this. And in the end, the shareholders and the owners have decided to dispense of his services.”

Christian Horner lost Red Bull ‘power struggle’

Sky Sports F1 pitlane reporter Ted Kravitz said Horner ultimately lost a “power struggle” which had been going on for 18 months following allegations made against the Red Bull boss by a female employee in early 2024.

“I think we’ve known there has been this split in the camp ever since Bahrain last year, where Jos Verstappen came out and said it’s all chaos, Christian needs to leave and it can’t continue if Christian stays,” Kravitz said.

“He survived that, just like he’s survived so many controversies. The Piranha Club of F1 team bosses is well known and Christian was the longest-serving after the death of the great Frank Williams.

“In that real cut-throat world of the team bosses, you make friends, you make enemies. You wouldn’t how long it would take before the other piranhas ate him up.

“But in the end it seems to be, the Helmut Marko, the Oliver Mintzlaff, the Austrian side of the business, backed by Jos Verstappen and we assume Max Verstappen, have won in the power struggle. 

"They’ve managed to convince whatever backers Christian had in the team that it just wasn’t tenable to carry on.”