F1 Legend Adrian Newey Leaves Red Bull

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Adrian Newey, the legendary Formula 1 engineer and car designer behind golden ages for Williams, McLaren, and Red Bull, has announced that he plans to leave the Austrian energy drink's F1 team at the start of 2025. Newey's next destination is not with F1, the team announces, but with finishing its RB17 hypercar. That is to say, he's out, but he's not going far, at least not for the moment.

F1 loves to play with the grey areas betwween the letter of the law and the spirit of the law, so let's look at the precise language of Red Bull's announcement of Newey's departure, sent via a Tweet on Wednesday:

The team further thanked Newey for contributing to Red Bull's seven drivers' titles, six constructors' championships, its 118 victories and 101 poles, counting also the time Sebastian Vettel won a rainy Monza in 2008 from the Scuderia Toro Rosso junior team. A complete press release pointing out that Newey leaves after 19 years at Red Bull can be found here.

The news was first reported by Germany's Auto Motor und Sport, then in more detail by BBC Sport. Each report suggests that Newey's departure is a result of the power struggle within the team, one that sees recent internal investigation subject Christian Horner and Thai company leadership on one side against the brand's Austrian leadership on another. Finally, the BBC report ends with another bombshell: Further confirmation that the Mercedes-AMG F1 team is actively pursuing Verstappen as soon as the 2025 season, despite his contract running through 2028.

Adrian Newey has been working with Red Bull on an announced but unseen new road-going hypercar, the RB17. In his capacity with Red Bull, he previously worked on the Aston Martin Valkyrie hypercar that finally reached customers last year. Aston Martin has since announced plans to take the Valkyrie racing at Le Mans and in North America, and Newey could work with that operation if he were to join the Aston Martin team. At Ferrari, Newey could choose to work with an existing Le Mans-winning hypercar program and would have the opportunity to pair with new Ferrari signee Lewis Hamilton.

Newey's next step will be watched with great interest. On two separate previous occasions, the designer left a championship-winning F1 organization only to quickly get back to winning titles with another constructor. Many teams will bid on his services in an effort to continue that trend, but reports like those from the BBC and Auto Motor und Sport since the move became a possibility suggest that the biggest players are Ferrari and Aston Martin. The former is in desperate need of direction after 15 seasons without a constructor's title. The latter is an ambitious riser, one fueled by the combined financial might of billionaire Lawrence Stroll and the Saudi Arabian state oil company, Aramco. Mercedes, an eight-time constructor's champion that has not scored a title since regulations changed in 2022, could also be a factor in any decision.

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