Red Bull doubles down on surprise Gianpiero Lambiase McLaren claim
Gianpiero Lambiase has been rumoured to be in line for the McLaren team principal job, a position currently held by Andrea Stella
Red Bull Formula 1 boss Laurent Mekies has doubled down on his claim that Max Verstappen’s race engineer, Gianpiero Lambiase, will become McLaren’s team principal.
Mekies made the surprise claim that Lambiase was joining McLaren to eventually replace current team principal Andrea Stella earlier this month at the Miami Grand Prix.
McLaren denied this, with Zak Brown explaining that Lambiase would simply alleviate some of Stella’s current workload in his position as chief racing officer upon his arrival, which will be in 2028 at the latest.
Mekies’s comments in Miami led to a meeting between him and Brown to discuss Lambiase, with the matter seemingly put to bed.
However, Mekies raised fresh questions about McLaren’s plan for Lambiase on the eve of the Canadian Grand Prix.
“Look, it’s certainly my understanding that GP is going to McLaren to become a team principal. That’s what I told you at the time,” Mekies said.
“Obviously, we had a number of conversations before he was going to make the decision. Now, don’t ask me if it’s going to happen; the timing of it is none of my business. I can just tell you the content of our conversations.”
Stella took aim at rumours surrounding his future in an interview on McLaren’s website back in April.
The 55-year-old Italian, who was sat alongside Mekies in Friday’s team principal’s press conference, said: “What I said before is that McLaren, for us, it’s important to employ the best talents in Formula 1 because Zak and I want to build the strongest team, not only in the present, but I think we have some good references as to strong teams in the past.
"I have been part of the Ferrari team in the early 2000s, and I know what level of seniority, expertise, and leadership you need to be successful in the present and in the future. And employing GP is part of this vision, which is a vision of creating additive leadership that can integrate with the present leadership and create a stronger and stronger team at McLaren.
“So, I very strongly wanted GP to join McLaren. I am personally very stretched in my role as Team Principal, and I need a strong group of leaders working with me. So, I think the plan is very clear. Any other speculation leads us back to the silly season.”
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