McLaren is accelerating efforts to get hold of Red Bull\u2019s engineer Gianpiero Lambiase early \u2013 with a deliberately brazen paddock meeting helping draw attention to the matter.<\/p>\n
Lambiase, who is Red Bull\u2019s head of racing and has long been Max Verstappen\u2019s race engineer, has agreed to join McLaren as its new head of racing.<\/p>\n
However, with his current contract with Red Bull running until the end of next year, unless an early exit is agreed then McLaren will have to wait until the start of 2028 to get hold of him.<\/p>\n
McLaren is eager not to delay Lambiase\u2019s integration so long, and has held a series of discussions over recent months with Red Bull about whether there are grounds to reach a compromise deal.<\/p>\n
However, nothing has been arranged so far \u2013 but it now appears to be ramping up efforts for some movement.<\/p>\n
Intriguingly, Lambiase and McLaren CEO Zak Brown chose a very conspicuous spot in the Madring paddock on Saturday morning \u2013 at a caf\u00e9 table right by the main thoroughfare – for a chat.<\/p>\n
The choice of location, one easily captured by photographers and camera crews, was interesting because the pair could easily have met in a quieter spot in the huge pit and paddock complex at the Spanish Grand Prix venue.<\/p>\n
Instead, by choosing the caf\u00e9, the aim was almost certainly to send a message that the pair are openly talking.<\/p>\n
This could influence Red Bull to think there is little to gain by delaying Lambiase’s release.<\/p>\n
Handover debate<\/p>\n
McLaren’s hopes of securing a deal appeared to have increased recently with Red Bull having settled on its replacement plans for Lambiase.<\/p>\n
The squad has signed Aston Martin\u2019s Tom McCullough as its new head of racing from next year, while Tom Hart is to take over as Verstappen\u2019s race engineer.<\/p>\n
With those appointments in place, McLaren senses an opportunity to not have to wait until 2028, so it has started pushing again to see if there are grounds for Red Bull to let Lambiase go early.<\/p>\n
However, Red Bull appears to be in no rush to fast track a release \u2013 as it is still weighing up what to do.<\/p>\n
The Race understands that one of Red Bull\u2019s big considerations is how best it wants to handle the transition to the new arrivals.<\/p>\n
A priority is a good enough handover so both McCullough and Hart do not face a cold start in their new roles.<\/p>\n
Red Bull has already begun preparations for Hart\u2019s closer integration with Verstappen.<\/p>\n
He has begun acting as Verstappen\u2019s engineer in some practice sessions \u2013 which will continue in Baku \u2013 and is set to take over for full race-weekends towards the end of the season. This may start from the United States Grand Prix.<\/p>\n
A handover to McCullough, who does not join until the start of 2027, would have to wait until the start of next year though \u2013 which would mean Lambiase not being in place at McLaren for the start of the season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"McLaren is accelerating efforts to get hold of Red Bull\u2019s engineer Gianpiero Lambiase early \u2013 with a deliberately…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":890294,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-890293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/890293","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=890293"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/890293\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/890294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=890293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=890293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=890293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}