Red Bull insider shares the ‘different feel’ within the team at Hungarian GP after ‘mourning’ Christian Horner

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Some members of the Red Bull team found it difficult to adjust to new leadership within the team after Christian Horner’s sacking in July, following 20 years in charge of the team.

Laurent Mekies took over from the 51-year-old on the day that Horner‘s dismissal was announced, and the Frenchman faced a three-week wait before making his first appearance on the Red Bull pitwall in Belgium.

Helmut Marko noted the different leadership style Mekies has from his predecessor, highlighting his 14-hour shifts at the factory as just one part of his incredible work ethic.

Yuki Tsunoda contrasted Mekies and Horner in the lead-up to the Hungarian GP, highlighting Mekies’ increased interest in utilising driver feedback to improve their performances. The same feeling has been shared by other drivers who have raced under Mekies, including Carlos Sainz.

READ MORE: All you need to know about Red Bull team principal and CEO Laurent Mekies

Laurent Mekies has motivated Red Bull to focus on ‘going racing’ again after ‘a bit of insecurity’

Speaking on The Inside Track podcast, journalist and Red Bull insider Matt Majendie touched upon the change in sentiment he felt throughout the Red Bull setup in Belgium compared to that in Hungary, the following week.

“It was different in Spa,” Majendie started. “We talked about that sort of sense of mourning, a bit of insecurity. People are a bit lost. Didn’t quite know what they were doing.

“It’s not like they’ve forgotten Christian Horner, but Formula 1 moves forward so quickly that it’s like, oh, that was last week’s news. Now we’re back to going racing. There was a different feel in the team, motivated to get things right. Obviously, that didn’t work at that track.”

Max Verstappen is set to stay at Red Bull for another season at the very least, and the four-time world champion will have appreciated the focus on getting back to racing as soon as possible after a month-long circus that had his future at the team up for debate.

READ MORE: All you need to know about Red Bull Racing from engine to Ford links

Laurent Mekies will see the summer break as a reset point for his start at Red Bull

After getting off to a good start to his tenure with Red Bull at the Belgian GP, F1 fans were divided about Mekies’ instant impact.

Verstappen went on to take the chequered flag in Saturday’s Sprint race, but the performance of the RB21 went downhill from there, with the delay for the Belgian GP hampering his wet-weather setup.

Verstappen’s telemetry at the Hungarian GP showed a ‘striking’ deficit to the McLaren frontrunners. The four-time world champion had a weekend to forget after registering his worst qualifying since last year’s Sao Paulo GP and his second-lowest Grand Prix result of the season.

After taking over just weeks prior to F1’s summer shutdown, Mekies can come back at the end of August and focus on the remaining ten rounds to try and turn around Red Bull’s falling trajectory.

The team are at risk of falling so far behind in the constructors’ championship that they cement themselves in fourth place, a far cry from the back-to-back titles we saw them win in 2022 and 2023.