Christian Horner\u2019s autobiography is \u201ca collection of untruths\u201d and \u201ccompletely incomprehensible\u201d, according to former Red Bull motorsport adviser Helmut Marko.<\/p>\n
Horner and Marko are former allies who became rivals in a bitter factional dispute that ultimately blew up both their careers with the team.<\/p>\n
Marko, 83 years old, was the conduit between motorsport and the Austrian drinks business, founded and run by Dietrich Mateschitz.<\/p>\n
Fox Sports, available on Kayo Sports, is the only place to watch every practice, qualifying session and race in the 2026 FIA Formula One World Championship\u2122 LIVE in 4K | Get Kayo now.<\/a><\/p>\n Mateschitz originally put him in charge of developing Red Bull-backed drivers, which brought him into contact with Horner when both were involved as managers in Formula 3000.<\/p>\n Their chance meeting became a working friendship, and when Marko convinced Mateschitz to buy the Jaguar Formula 1 team and turn it into Red Bull Racing, he backed Horner to be its team principal.<\/p>\n Together they ran the team, but the power dynamic was often uneasy, with neither answerable to each other but not always working in parallel.<\/p>\n That delicate balance broke down when Mateschitz died in 2022, creating a power vacuum at the team.<\/p>\n Horner and Marko suddenly became rivals as they contested control over Red Bull Racing and the brand\u2019s other F1 interests.<\/p>\n But the board took issue with the level of control Horner exercised over the team. It had historically operated independently of Austria, but the new leadership saw it as an extension of the Red Bull drinks company.<\/p>\n Following a workplace scandal, the resignations of key staff and the team\u2019s subsequent decline in form, the board pulled the trigger on Horner\u2019s contract halfway through last year, paying him out a staggering \u00a3100.5 million ($191.8 million) to cancel his contract \u2014 more that had been originally reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n Marko believed he had won the battle, but by the end of the year he was gone too<\/a>, with his own series of gaffes \u2014 including unilaterally signing two drivers without permission of the board and regular unauthorised media leaks \u2014 sealing his fate.<\/p>\n Miller talks on highs & lows of career | 11:39<\/p>\n In Horner\u2019s autobiography Drive, published this week, the Englishman regularly paints Marko as a roadblock to his running of the team.<\/p>\n In one passage he described him turning his nose up at the prospect of hiring Lewis Hamilton because of the pressure it might have applied to Red Bull\u2019s young drivers.<\/p>\n In an interview supporting his book, he recounts Marko dismissing George Russell, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri as potential Red Bull prospects despite them being more impressive than his own hand-picked young guns.<\/p>\n He even suggests Marko had originally refused to sign Verstappen because of the disruptive potential of his father.<\/p>\n Marko denied the negative characterisation to Germany\u2019s Sky Sport<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a collection of untruths; I don\u2019t even want to stoop to that level,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cGiven the massive severance package he received, one might have expected a bit of loyalty. And, once again: it\u2019s just not my level.\u201d<\/p>\n Marko also took issue with the book being released on 22 October, the same date Mateschitz died.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think he even realises that his biography is being released on the very anniversary of Dietrich Mateschitz\u2019s death. But that\u2019s entirely in keeping with this whole book affair.<\/p>\n \u201cTo me, it\u2019s all completely incomprehensible.\u201d<\/p>\n Marko did take up one accusation, made to German paper <\/a>Bild<\/a>, that he refused to offer Horner condolences after the death of his ex-wife, who died shortly before he was sacked.<\/p>\n \u201cThe only thing I wish to set straight is this: I actually sent him a written message of condolence regarding his ex-wife, who passed away from cancer. That is the only thing that matters to me.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no interest [in talking to Horner]. And now this book! I\u2019m only hearing about all of this through third parties. Once the book is out, perhaps he\u2019ll send me a copy, and then I might read it.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no plans to write a book myself \u2014 even though there are plenty of things I could write about. But I would never stoop to such a level.\u201d<\/p>\n “Taking on the baton sounds crazy!” | 08:53<\/p>\n \u2018I FELT SO DISAPPOINTED\u2019 WHEN RICCIARDO QUIT<\/p>\n Horner also touches on Daniel Ricciardo\u2019s decision to quit Red Bull Racing at the end of 2018 after protracted contract negotiations.<\/p>\n \u201cI felt so disappointed,\u201d he wrote. \u201cDietrich had offered Daniel a great deal; it had been agreed with a handshake. Now he was leaving us for Renault, when several other superior teams, McLaren included, wanted to sign him. None of it made sense to me.\u201d<\/p>\n Elsewhere in the book he claims that Ricciardo saw the writing on the wall as Verstappen grew in strength in the sister car.<\/p>\n \u201cAcross the garage, Daniel sensed his time was coming to an end at Red Bull,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was now the quicker of our two drivers (he finished fourth in the drivers\u2019 championship; Daniel was sixth) but he also possessed the killer instinct I\u2019d feared Daniel was lacking.\u201d<\/p>\n Both Verstappen and Ricciardo won two races apiece that year, but the Australian suffered seven mechanical retirements to the Dutchman\u2019s three.<\/p>\n \u201cAs had been the case with Sebastian and Mark several years previously, Helmut made little secret of where his loyalties stood. In meetings, he only seemed interested in Max\u2019s car, which was frustrating for Daniel \u2026 by the summer of 2018, I got the impression that Helmut wanted Daniel to leave at a time when Red Bull wanted to extend his contract.\u201d<\/p>\n He also doubles down on both drivers having been to blame for causing their race-ending crash at the 2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix<\/a> despite the widespread perception that Verstappen had triggered the prang by moving in the braking zone.<\/p>\n He unironically likened it to him equally apportioning the blame between Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel for their crash at the 2010 Turkish Grand Prix.<\/p>\n Speaking to <\/a>The Age<\/a> after his decision to quit Red Bull Racing, Ricciardo said he \u201cstruggled to let [the Baku crash] go\u201d and admitted that it played a part in feeling unloved at the team.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was nothing physical \u2014 it\u2019s not like Max had, say, a better or newer front wing than me,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cBut he committed to the team for so long so early and signed such a big deal, and there was a feeling for me that the team was thinking, \u2018He\u2019s put more faith in us than you have, and you\u2019re taking so long to negotiate\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cPerhaps Red Bull thought, \u2018You\u2019re not going to go anywhere else\u2019, but I think that\u2019s the wrong mentality.<\/p>\n \u201cI felt like I had to work too hard to justify what I wanted, and what the performances I\u2019ve had say I should be worth. Perhaps the love just wasn\u2019t there.\u201c<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Christian Horner\u2019s autobiography is \u201ca collection of untruths\u201d and \u201ccompletely incomprehensible\u201d, according to former Red Bull motorsport adviser…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":937431,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-937430","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\/937430","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=937430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/937431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=937430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=937430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=937430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}