Ted Kravitz hails Christian Horner for leadership of ‘uncontrollable’ figure at Red Bull

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Sky Sports reporter Ted Kravitz has admitted that he’s been really impressed by how Christian Horner has managed Red Bull in the past 12 months and in particular the way he dealt with Helmut Marko.

Christian Horner led Red Bull to the most dominant season in Formula 1 history with Max Verstappen winning 19 out of a possible 22 races.

However, speaking on the Sky Sports F1 Podcast, Kravitz praised how he managed to deal with so many difficult characters while maintaining their lead over the rest of the grid.

One of the most exciting aspects of any Formula 1 season is what’s going on behind the scenes at Red Bull.

There were only two driver changes during 2023 and it’s no surprise they both came at sister team AlphaTauri.

After 10 races, Nyck de Vries was replaced by Daniel Ricciardo as Christian Horner and Helmut Marko saw an opportunity to get the Australian back on the grid.

He was then replaced by Liam Lawson after injuring his hand and while the Kiwi impressed, he couldn’t earn a permanent spot on the grid.

Ted Kravitz has praised how Christian Horner led a team full of very big personalities including Helmut Marko.

The Austrian sent warnings to Sergio Perez that he needed to up his game and one in particular was so bad he had to apologise.

Kravitz praises Horner leadership at Red Bull with ‘uncontrollable’ Marko

Speaking about the 50-year-old team boss, Kravitz said: “It’s a bit complicated when it comes to who’s around and above Christian Horner at Red Bull.

“And I think the only way you could mark down Christian Horner is for the way the Sergio Perez situation was dealt with and the way that he was not able to control Helmut Marko.

“Now Helmut Marko is uncontrollable, he’s an uncontrollable force but Marko’s unacceptable comments about Sergio Perez were not very quickly jumped on because he can’t.

“In a way, this is the genius of what Horner has managed to achieve at Red Bull Racing because say what you want about Christian Horner but he is juggling some situations, some hot stones, that you have no idea how difficult they are.

“He is jugging some component and volatile parts. Max Verstappen who could be shown that when the car isn’t to his liking is very vocal about it and can have a short fuse on the radio with GP his engineer, we know that.

“He’s juggling Helmut Marko who’s the definition of a loose cannon, he’s juggling Oliver Mintzlaff his new boss at Red Bull Racing who’s finding his way in charge of the racing programme.

“He’s jugging Sergio Perez and getting Checo back to what they want to do and he’s juggling everything else, the political side of Formula 1. So, he’s doing an amazing job.”

As Kravitz says, Horner could end up with more issues to deal with than just Marko if Red Bull’s performance starts to drop off.

Now that Verstappen has tasted what it’s like to dominate Formula 1, he won’t want to give up his stranglehold on the rest of the grid.

That puts even more pressure on Horner to make sure they get their powertrains right in 2026.