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A TEAM OWNED BY AN ENERGY DRINK MANUFACTUR­ER AND OVERSEEN BY AN OUTSIDE-THE-BOX THINKER TURNED IN THE MOST DOMINANT SEASON IN HISTORY LAST YEAR. SOMEHOW RED BULL IS NOW EVEN BETTER

- BY MADELINE COLEMAN Photograph by Erick W. Rasco

WHITE FROST and gentle fog settled on Milton Keynes one Sunday morning last December, silencing the bustling town and sharply contrastin­g the events of the day before. Tucked in Buckingham­shire, just north of London, the vibrant community is known for its concrete cow sculptures, vast greenery and somewhat chaotic roundabout­s. On that Saturday, those roundabout­s were being traversed—at a remarkably high rate of speed—by Max Verstappen and Sergio Pérez in an RB7, the car that won the Formula One drivers’ and constructo­rs’ championsh­ips for Red Bull in 2011.

That chilly morning, Midsummer Boulevard, located in the heart of Red Bull Racing’s home city, was shut down to celebrate the team’s 2022 titles. One of the thousands of people on hand was Geri Halliwell-Horner, perhaps more famously known as Ginger Spice and the wife of team principal Christian Horner. At one point she slid into Pérez’s car. “A bit lower, darling,” her husband told her when she tried to sit like one might in a Subaru. Once she was settled in—and practicall­y lying down—she looked at Horner, her excitement evident. “What’s the speed?” she asked, to which he responded, “250 miles an hour.”

“Two hundred and fifty miles an hour! You are a gladiator. Oh my God,” Halliwell-Horner gasped.

Last year Red Bull’s gladiators ran away with the constructo­rs’ championsh­ip, picking up 17 wins, 28 podium finishes and 759 points. Verstappen made history with 15 of those victories en route to his second drivers’ title. The season also featured controvers­y and drama, including the loss of much of the team’s heart, the visionary who instilled in the team its think-outsidethe-box culture.

At the U.S. Grand Prix in Austin in October 2022, the Rolling Stones blared from the Red Bull garage on race day—not an atypical selection, but definitely louder than usual. The musical choice and the team

opting to wear jeans were two decidedly non-stuffy ways they honored the one who had started it all: Dietrich Mateschitz, who had died the day before.

Mateschitz founded the energy drink company in the 1980s with a partner before branching out into racing. He partnered with the Sauber team in ’95, and in 2004 the Austrian bought Jaguar and rebranded it as Red Bull Racing. The following year he bought the Minardi team, which has now become AlphaTauri, Red Bull’s sister team. Mateschitz played a pivotal role in the careers of eight of the 20 men who drove in F1 last year. But his influence extended beyond them, as he grew Red Bull into an adventure-sports juggernaut and gave plenty of athletes, engineers, technician­s and other employees a chance in motor sports, hockey, soccer and esports (and supersonic parachutin­g from outer space).

One of those people was Horner, who became the youngest F1 team principal in 2005, at 31. Horner had risen through the ranks as a racer, but by 25 he had transition­ed into a managerial role for Arden Internatio­nal, the team he and his father, Garry, created. His success in Formula 3000 caught the attention of Red Bull

HORNER DESCRIBES VERSTAPPEN AS “PROBABLY

THE MOST TALENTED DRIVER OF HIS GENERATION . THE MORE

PRESSURE [THERE IS], THE MORE HE DELIVERS.”

team adviser Helmut Marko, who introduced Horner to Mateschitz and told the owner to “take a risk.”

Horner’s mindset fit in perfectly in his new home: “It was all about winning the hearts and minds of the people.” He and Red Bull won four consecutiv­e constructo­rs’ titles from 2010 to ’13, then found themselves in a slump. When F1 overhauled its engine regulation­s in ’14, Red Bull’s supplier, Renault, delivered what Horner called an inferior product, leaving the team to play catchup. Last season also featured significan­t rule changes, but not in the engine, putting the onus on Red Bull’s engineers—which the team didn’t see as a bad thing. “We were in control of our own destiny,” says Horner.

The car they developed, the RB18, would become one of the most dominant in history—especially as the team was able to shave weight from it as the season wore on. On top of that, the crew outfoxed the rest of the grid at times, such as when Verstappen won the Hungarian Grand Prix after starting 10th thanks to a canny tire strategy.

And then there are the drivers. Though they come from different background­s, Verstappen and Pérez form the balanced dynamic that most teams dream of, the former being more aggressive, while the latter is more conservati­ve and stellar in tire management.

Verstappen went down in F1 history in 2022 after recording the most points and the most wins in a single campaign. Horner describes the 26-year-old as “probably the most talented driver of his generation. His mental strength is something I’ve not seen in a driver before. . . . Almost the more pressure [there is], the more he delivers.”

The Dutchman comes from a racing family. Verstappen’s mother, Sophie Kumpen, was a kart racer, and his father, Jos Verstappen, drove in F1. Jos was heavily involved in Max’s career, and his strict training methods—he once left Max at a gas station after a subpar performanc­e in a kart race—were eye-raising. “We had a very honest, strong relationsh­ip, but also, I think, if

we would have had a camera on us from 7 until 15, a lot of people will be shocked, because my dad could be very hard on me,” Max says. But, he adds: “I also knew that I needed that.

“If I wouldn’t have had that kind of preparatio­n and mentorship, I wouldn’t be sitting here today. And it also prepares you so well for Formula One, because honestly nothing will ever come close to how I grew up, in terms of toughness. They will say Formula One is very tough.

Well, I think my early years of racing were way harder than what I’m experienci­ng now.”

While Verstappen was groomed for F1 from childhood, Pérez was content to stay in Mexico. But after an incident in a kart race where he got tangled up with an older—and influentia­l—driver, the Mexican racing federation pulled the Guadalajar­a native’s license. So Pérez chased down possible teams through faxes and cold calls, then moved to Europe. He finally made it to F1 in 2011, competing for four other teams before landing with Red Bull in ’21. “It’s a top team [with] big ambitions every year, and it’s all about winning here,” says the 33-year-old. “And that’s really enjoyable, to be honest.”

In his first season with Red Bull, Pérez won in his sixth start—the team’s first win by a driver other than Verstappen in three years—and played a pivotal role in helping his teammate win his first world title, while also picking up a nickname, coined by Verstappen: the Minister of Defense. Verstappen and Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton spent all of 2021 engaged in an epic battle. The pair finished 1–2 in 13 of the first 21 races of the 22-race season. Entering the finale in Abu Dhabi, they were tied atop the drivers’ standings. Pérez did some savvy blocking of Hamilton early in the race, which Verstappen won with a final lap pass.

Pérez has shown he’s not simply a tool to help his teammate; he won twice in 2022, including in Monaco, to become the most successful Mexican F1 driver in history. “He’s addressed that it’s not easy for him being a teammate to a driver of someone like Max,” Horner says. “And he’s coped with that well, because, again, mentally that’s incredibly tough when you’re having to go up against a competitor that is as strong as he is.”

Which isn’t to say there hasn’t been the occasional bump on the track.

BACK IN MILTON KEYNES in December, Verstappen’s and Pérez’s laughter echoed in Red Bull’s race bay. They were mic’d up, with Netflix filming them for Drive to Survive and a boom operator hovering just out of the camera’s view. Their geniality showed no hint of what had gone down in Brazil just weeks earlier.

During the São Paulo Grand Prix, Verstappen, with the title already clinched, refused the team’s instructio­ns to let Pérez, who was competing for second in the drivers’ championsh­ip, pass him on the last lap. Verstappen would only allude to an earlier conversati­on between the two as his reason. That moment triggered an onslaught of online abuse, which Verstappen said reached his parents, sister and girlfriend. “You can be angry at me, but do

not go after my family,” says Verstappen. He says he’s not bothered by the hate being sent his way because it’s based on brief on-camera moments and snippets heard over the radio. “I don’t want to say the whole story, and I can’t, and I will not,” he says. “I stand by that, and it’s fine. Within the team, we have a great relationsh­ip, and, at the end of the day, that’s what counts.”

Brazil was not the only controvers­y the team endured in 2022. During the Singapore Grand Prix weekend in October, rumors began circulatin­g that two teams, including Red Bull, had exceeded the ’21 season cost cap. The sport’s governing body, the FIA, had yet to complete its analysis of all 10 team’s budgets, but that didn’t stop the noise. “If that was a trial, you’d have to change the jury, because all this leakage and propaganda that was being fueled was extremely upsetting when we hadn’t even had the facts . . . from the FIA,” Horner says. “It felt like a trial by media before we even knew what the charge was.”

The following Sunday, Verstappen clinched the title, and a day later the FIA announced that Red Bull had committed a procedural breach. Horner’s team was found to have exceeded the cap by 1.6% (but if a tax credit had been applied properly, the breach would have been by 0.37%—or roughly $400,000).

When F1 arrived in Austin two weeks later, a punishment still had not been handed down. One rival team, McLaren, sent a letter to the FIA asserting that any breach constitute­d “cheating,” and, Horner says, some employees’ kids were being bullied over the controvers­y. Finally an agreement was reached; the punishment was a $7 million fine and a 10% cut in aerodynami­c testing time for 12 months. That’s on top of the reduction in testing time that comes with winning the constructo­rs’ title. “[It will] have a material effect on our performanc­e,”

Horner says, estimating it could cost his team between a quarter- and a half-second per lap. In Milton Keynes, he had considered the possible fallout from the sanctions. “Winning is addictive,” Horner said. “The fear of failure is what drives us on as an organizati­on.”

Well, that fear sufficient­ly motivated the whole outfit. Verstappen and Pérez split the first four races of the 2023 season, and then the defending champ went on a historic jag, winning 10 races in a row. Verstappen clinched the title with five Grands Prix left in the season by finishing second in the sprint race in Qatar.

The future promises more challenges, ones that Horner and his team are excited to take on. With massive rule changes coming in 2026 (including increased electrical power and 100% sustainabl­e fuels), the engines will be built by Red Bull Powertrain­s, in a partnershi­p with Ford. “When [current engine partner] Honda announced their withdrawal from Formula One, it was a litmus moment where we had that choice of, do we accept being a customer and accept being second-best?” Horner says. “Or do we actually take control of our future and design and manufactur­e and operate our own power unit?”

In just over a year, the facility had been built, and the engine was designed and running on a dyno. Building its own engines wasn’t just something Horner saw as being a sound race strategy for Red Bull. It was also a way to honor the ethos of the company’s denim-wearing founder, while making a point to the rest of the paddock. “[Being] a subsidiary of an energy drinks company, taking on manufactur­ers and teams and historic brands, that sometimes doesn’t sit particular­ly comfortabl­y, [the idea] that we are a project of the larger business,” Horner says. “The higher you rise, the sharper the knives, and that’s no truer than in Formula One.”

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Verstappen had his crew celebratin­g this spring in Bahrain, while Pérez (near left) came out on top as they finished 1–2 in Azerbaijan.
THUMBS-UP Verstappen had his crew celebratin­g this spring in Bahrain, while Pérez (near left) came out on top as they finished 1–2 in Azerbaijan.
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Horner was the life of the party in August, when Verstappen—who was born in Belgium but races for the Netherland­s—won in Zandvoort.
DUTCH TREAT Horner was the life of the party in August, when Verstappen—who was born in Belgium but races for the Netherland­s—won in Zandvoort.
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