{"id":444101,"date":"2026-01-29T01:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T01:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/444101\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T01:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T01:22:09","slug":"christian-horners-fia-meeting-with-mohammed-ben-sulayem-fuels-f1-return-rumours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/444101\/","title":{"rendered":"Christian Horner&#8217;s FIA meeting with Mohammed Ben Sulayem fuels F1 return rumours"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/team\/red-bull-racing\/4\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Red Bull Racing<\/a> CEO and team principal Christian Horner has visited the FIA in Paris, raising questions among Formula 1 fans.<\/p>\n<p>Horner was replaced in his role at the Milton Keynes outfit by Laurent Mekies on 9 July 2025. There have been multiple rumours surrounding a potential return of the Briton to the paddock. However, nothing has been confirmed at this stage. But as FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem shared moments from Horner&#8217;s visit on social media, it has led to more speculation.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Wonderful to welcome Christian Horner to the FIA Paris offices today. Good to see you my friend,&#8221; the FIA president wrote on Instagram.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Definitely Buying that F1 team \u2026 Let\u2019s go,&#8221; one fan wrote, while another added: &#8220;What\u2019s he buying \u2026 grid is boring without him.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Many of the comments pointed to the recent rumours linking Horner with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/team\/alpine\/24858\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Alpine<\/a>. The French team confirmed this week that the former Red Bull team chief was part of a group of investors who have shown interest in the outfit.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After Otro Capital, which includes celebrity investors such as actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, and athletes Travis Kelce, Patrick Mahomes and Rory McIlroy, acquired a 24% stake in Alpine in 2023, the investment group is now considering selling its stake.<\/p>\n<p>Addressing the rumours that Horner could invest, Alpine said in a statement:\u00a0&#8220;It is no secret that Otro Capital has held preliminary talks to sell its stake in the team.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;\u2060With the continued rapid growth of Formula 1, the valuation of the teams has been increasing and, not surprisingly, has led to multiple interested parties looking to enter the sport.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;\u2060The team is regularly approached and contacted from potential investors, particularly given Otro Capital declared exploratory talks have taken place. One of those parties to express an interest is a group of investors, which also includes Christian Horner.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;\u2060Any approaches or discussions are with the existing shareholders, Otro Capital [24%] and Renault Group [76%].&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>            We want your opinion!<\/p>\n<p class=\"mt-auto\">What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?<\/p>\n<p>            <a href=\"#\" class=\"ms-link text-link font-bold\">Take our 5 minute survey.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"mt-1 text-body\">&#8211; The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Red Bull Racing CEO and team principal Christian Horner has visited the FIA in Paris, raising questions&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":444102,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,195711,1199,230578,79010,817,813,816,85,1511],"class_list":["post-444101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-barcelona-catalunya-pre-season-testing","tag-christian-horner","tag-christian-horners-fia-meeting-with-mohammed-ben-sulayem-fuels-f1-return-rumours","tag-circuit-de-barcelona-catalunya","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports","tag-trendingteam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}