McLaren CEO Zak Brown has fired shots at Red Bull, claiming that the team has a very “toxic environment” at this stage. The team has gone through a lot this season. While most of it has been off-track, it’s hard to just assume that it would not have had a role to play in the team’s overall environment.
It all started with Red Bull boss Christian Horner being investigated followed by the beginning of an internal political battle where Horner appeared to be on one side while Helmut Marko and Jos Verstappen were on the other side of things.
For now, it seems to have culminated with Adrian Newey triggering an exit clause and leaving Red Bull. Since then, the ace designer has been linked with multiple teams. While the pen has not been put to paper, we’re looking at a scenario where he could lead to the exodus of some impressive talent from the team.
Talking about this on Bloomberg’s Hot Pursuit podcast, Zak Brown claimed that the team has a toxic environment right now with Newey leaving. He said.
“Red Bull is a pretty toxic environment right now. There is more to come. Newey’s departure is an important one, because I think a lot of people at Red Bull started working with him. I already mentioned that there were resumes circulating.”
He added,
“That happens all the time, but you see a higher level of discomfort. I also think that in the future it will be more difficult with sponsors, because they are going to examine carefully what they are associated with. That’s a tricky situation.
“The Max Verstappen drama makes it worse for Red Bull: Brown
The McLaren boss further added that the Max Verstappen drama and the uncertainty around his future was something that should make things uneasy as well. David Croft has recently claimed that Jos Verstappen was going around in the paddock and that Max has already signed a contract with Mercedes.
Brown was not too sure where the chips fell when it came to Max Verstappen but felt that the team was just not the same beast anymore. He said,
“You have the whole Verstappen drama. Is he staying or is he leaving? Max has a contract, only his father is pretty outspoken. Red Bull is a great racing team, but destabilised. You can see that with Newey leaving. However, you can never erase them.”
He added,
“As I said, they are an incredible team, just by my reasoning, they are not as strong as they used to be. If I look at who has the best path of visibility and momentum right now, it’s Ferrari and McLaren. Things can change quickly though, so we have to keep both feet on the ground.”
It will be interesting to see how Christian Horner reacts to this. The team principal has not been very friendly with Brown, and this will certainly make the two closer to each other in any way.