BOMB IN F1! Red Bull Loses Key Piece
Englishman Adrian Newey, technical director of Oracle Red Bull Racing and a member of the company since 2006, creator of the cars with which Sebastian Vettel and Max Verstappen have dominated Formula One in two different periods, will leave the group in the first quarter of 2025, as reported by the Austrian team.
The engineering chief, who also provided Mexican Sergio Pérez with a car with which he has achieved five of his six victories in the top category of motorsport, and with which he secured the runner-up last season, will step away from his Formula 1 design duties to focus on the final development and delivery of Red Bull's first hypercar, the eagerly anticipated RB17. Meanwhile, he "will remain involved and committed to this exciting project until its completion," the company reports.
Since joining Red Bull Racing in 2006, Adrian Newey's leadership has been instrumental in the team and the group achieving seven Formula 1 drivers' championship titles and six constructors' championships, with a total of 118 wins and 101 poles, including Toro Rosso's pole and victory in 2008, Sebastian Vettel's first win.
"Since I was a child, I wanted to design fast cars. My dream was to be an engineer in Formula One, and I have been fortunate enough to make it a reality. For almost two decades, it has been a great honor for me to have played a key role in the progress of Red Bull Racing from a newcomer to a multiple-title-winning team. However, I feel that now is an opportune time to pass that baton on to others and seek new challenges for myself," Newey said in the statement.
"It has been a real privilege, and I am confident that the engineering team is well-prepared for the work leading up to the final evolution of the car during the four-year period set by this regulation," he noted.
Adrian Newey's first actual design for the team, the RB3, secured a podium finish at the 2007 European Grand Prix. The following year, his design clinched the group's first win with Vettel and Toro Rosso at the Italian GP.
Following regulatory changes, his design of the RB5 gave the team its first win, at the 2009 Chinese Grand Prix, and five more wins that season.
In 2010, the RB6 led the team to its first double title, an achievement repeated in each of the three subsequent years. The introduction of hybrid power in F1 in 2014 led to tougher times and a first step back from Adrian Newey's exclusive commitment to F1 to allow for the creation of the Valkyrie hypercar.
The arrival of Honda as the team's power unit partner in 2019 reignited Adrian Newey's competitive spark. The RB16B clinched its first championship in eight years in 2021. A comprehensive rule change for the following season resulted in another design, the RB18, leading to a new era of dominance that began in 2022 and continues to this day.