[Team] Red Bull: Unbullievable

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

A little while ago, maybe a year or so, Horner banned Verstappen Snr from the pit/garage area simply because he was trying to throw his weight around and generally interfering with the smooth running of the team.

It's happened more than once. He was also told to 'let the team do their f***g job' when Max was at STR and he was interfering.

[Mike Harte]

There's definitely no love between the two. As father of the wonderkid, he feels entitled to tell others how to do their jobs.

[Sandgroper]

Originally Posted by Tone

Jos Verstappen calling for Horner to go, awkward

https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/jo...tays/10582532/

Tail wagging the dog.

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by Sandgroper

Tail wagging the dog.

Sure CH could refuse to allow Jos into the pit garages. Jos has nothing to do with RB. Now he is threatening to take Max away and possibly putting him at Mercedes. Surely Max is in charge of his own destiny?

[Peter Mallett]

Originally Posted by Aysedasi

Aside from being Max's dad, does Verstappen Snr actually have any clout within RBR? Sorry if it's a simplistic question... Is Max going to walk away from RBR just because his Dad doesn't like Horner? Seems about as unlikely as an unlikely thing in Unlikelytown.....

You can say that again.

[peebee2]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

You can say that again.

On the other hand, Mercedes need a new team leader, absolutely love Max Verstappen and have a virtually unlimited bag of money...

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by peebee2

On the other hand, Mercedes need a new team leader, absolutely love Max Verstappen and have a virtually unlimited bag of money...

That's as maybe, but unless Mercedes could guarantee Verstappen of a constantly winning car, along with Newey to keep it updated every year, I think it unlikely that he would move anywhere. I'm pretty sure that Red Bull have really very deep pockets, and would do everything financially to keep him happy.

[Tourer]

This article in Autosport speculates on what it all could mean - even the author seems to be now taking the view that it feels like some kind of orchestrated power play against Horner. Max to MB feels like a really big stretch though - but I guess if the bucks are there and he likes the challenge of taking the team back to the top, I suppose "never say never" and of course it would give him a chance to show that he he can do better than Hamilton in the same team (even if not the same year).

I have no doubt that drivers such as Lewis & Max really don't like to hear or read comments or claims saying they the car/team is the reason they've had such good results (even if it's true) and that adds some fuel to the desire to change teams and deliver success somewhere else (after all, it worked for Michael).

[Tourer]

In the meantime, Horner is focussed on going racing and not the reasons / motives / people behind all this. In his situation, I guess that is all you can do really.

[Skam85]

Interesting stance from Jos Verstappen on Christian Horner here considering his very well known and criminal issues with women.

what's that thing about glass houses and stones

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by Tourer

This article in Autosport speculates on what it all could mean - even the author seems to be now taking the view that it feels like some kind of orchestrated power play against Horner.

I would say that generally that article just sums up the situation including speculation that the current situation is maybe some type of proxy battler over control. I find it interesting that the article focuses on the power struggle and partnership drama and little or no mention about the veracity of investigations conclusions which is the elephant in the room for this entire mess. It seems like Horner is now positioning himself as the victim in all of this! Not a bad way to spin this.

Richard

[Teretonga]

Originally Posted by Richard C

I would say that generally that article just sums up the situation including speculation that the current situation is maybe some type of proxy battler over control. I find it interesting that the article focuses on the power struggle and partnership drama and little or no mention about the veracity of investigations conclusions which is the elephant in the room for this entire mess. It seems like Horner is now positioning himself as the victim in all of this! Not a bad way to spin this.

Richard

What if he is the real victim?
What if this complainant actually had designs on him but he backed away and all this is vindictive?
We don't know anything, really.
What's that old ditty about 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'?
The amount of discussion and judgement over this whole issue when it's all speculation and rumour is appalling.

There's no graciousness toward CH when there is nothing but third party insinuation and allegations.
Either the complainant fronts up and puts it in a formal complaint to an authority or leave it alone and put oneself in as much distance as possible to it.
How many of those ready to follow it and fling mud would want themselves outed and publicly identified for their comments about CH? Probably none of them.

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by Teretonga

What if he is the real victim?
What if this complainant actually had designs on him but he backed away and all this is vindictive?
We don't know anything, really.
What's that old ditty about 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'?
The amount of discussion and judgement over this whole issue when it's all speculation and rumour is appalling.

There's no graciousness toward CH when there is nothing but third party insinuation and allegations.
Either the complainant fronts up and puts it in a formal complaint to an authority or leave it alone and put oneself in as much distance as possible to it.
How many of those ready to follow it and fling mud would want themselves outed and publicly identified for their comments about CH? Probably none of them.

If the multiple President Trump damages claims are anything to go by, not getting the answer you want from an internal investigation definitely opens the pathway to putting the washing on a very public clothesline soon enough.

Doesn’t Mr Verstappen have a sibling Mercedes could use

[Skam85]

There's no way someone that texts (allegedly) like CH does could pull a Spice Girl.

[S griffin]

Originally Posted by Skam85

There's no way someone that texts (allegedly) like CH does could pull a Spice Girl.

How do you know the Spice Girl didn’t pull him?

[HDTVKSS]

if Verstappen went to MB, the fireworks from Jos vs Toto would be amazing....

I do feel sorry for Max in this as his old man certainly isn't doing him any favors. Max potentially also doesn't have the cleanest pair of hands with regard to the Piquet / Kvyatt situation - depending on who you believe.

As for CH - hes probably past the worst of it now. while it will taint him to some degree going forward, the noise will get less and less (assuming there are no other grand reveals). if anything by dumping the texts so close to the announcement probably helped him more than doing so 6 - 12 months down the track. a conspiracy theorist would perhaps suggest that it may have been in his interest to leak them himself to get the scandal out of the way, given it was likely they would have become public domain anyways via a future leak.

As along time RBR fan, im kinda torn. it feels ick, but also its a private matter that really is none of my or really the general publics business. he's certainly not the 1st motor sport figure to be caught with his pants down, and probably wont be the last. All we have now is Toto and Zak point scoring.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by Teretonga

What if he is the real victim?

In an infinite universe anything in possible. But of what part is he the victim? See my comments below.

Originally Posted by Teretonga

What if this complainant actually had designs on him but he backed away and all this is vindictive?

I go back to my earlier post. Is this some deep plot by his enemies who planted a mole to be is PA and to seduce him so that he would provide incriminating evidence that could be used against him? It would make a great fictional movie. I am not convinced this is ALL a big conspiracy against him. I think the simple answer (which I call out below) is that he put himself into a bad position, it was exposed, handled poorly and his enemies are using it against him.

Originally Posted by Teretonga

We don't know anything, really.

Debatable. The leak information continues to look real. I am still waiting on some evidence to the contrary.

Originally Posted by Teretonga

What's that old ditty about 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'?

Again possible. But no evidence. So that is as much fiction as anything

Originally Posted by Teretonga

The amount of discussion and judgement over this whole issue when it's all speculation and rumour is appalling.

But it's not all speculation.

Originally Posted by Teretonga

There's no graciousness toward CH when there is nothing but third party insinuation and allegations.

Frankly unrealistic expectations as to how you think he should be treated.

Originally Posted by Teretonga

Either the complainant fronts up and puts it in a formal complaint to an authority or leave it alone and put oneself in as much distance as possible to it.

Who says the complainant is driving the current drama?

You may be appalled at this, but my speculation on this is as follows.

The leak information is true. It may be a snapshot of a larger story, but in itself it is damning. I think both CH and the complainant acted poorly. There was lots of flirty banter and insinuations of more than an emotional affair. No real evidence that anything was directly physical. I think the complainant let it go way too far before saying "no". And it looks like that saying no resulted in changes to the complainants work situation and/or the "controlling behavior" that was mentioned. Not to mention continued pushing by CH for inappropriate things. Here in the US that would qualify under the "severe or pervasive" threshold for sexual harassment. I imagine elsewhere uses similar.

So both were not particularly stellar examples of professional behavior. Then layer on top the power differential and you will see that CH would (in most professional and modern organizations) have a larger responsibility to behave correctly. It seems at some point the complainant decided to start documenting things. And that seems to have lead to the complaint. One thing that is lacking in the reporting on this topic is exactly what the RBR, RBPT and RB itself has put in place regarding policies on this topic. For example does it call out impropriety of manager and subordinate relationships? Or if it allows them, that they must be registered with HR so that they are not hidden? Why is nobody asking those questions?

Where things went sideways is that (again speculation here) CH is in a highly political environment in which various people are ready to take advantage of a situation like this. Layer in the speculation that there is a fissure at the RB ownership level on how to address this. Who knows what the report said. Lets say it says something like that above (and again we don't know policies and procedures they should be following). So I can imaging the investigation/report from the barrister provides the specifics, but does not define actions such as punishment or any other remediation (which I think would make sense). That would be left up to HR/Sr management. This is where we can speculate that it got extremely political at the top level of RB. Lets again speculate that the decision was made to keep Horner, but also might not have been particularly inline with the spirit of the internal policies. So we can pick apart the statement from Red Bull (my opinion is that it is VERY vaguely worded so it implies he was cleared, etc) but this may have triggered the leak.

So who leaked? Assuming the content is real (and again, nobody has shown otherwise and all involved have not disavowed it) then it is either Horner, the complainant or someone who had access to the content. I would vote it was someone (or some group) inside Red Bull that was not happy that Horner was going to remain so they went with the nuclear option and released the information. There are other permutations of this that might work as well. But it generally follows that it was trying to sink Horner.

So going on my theory above (which is inline with most of what is being talked about and pretty inline with the article posted earlier, but with me filling in some blanks) you can say that both CH and the complainant acted inappropriately and unprofessionally. With the much larger burden being on CH. So CH is NOT the victim in that part.

CH getting dragged through the mud publicly is unfortunate, embarrassing and damaging to his career. Is he a victim here? By the strict definition that he was harmed by an action, then yes. So I guess he can play the victim card. But IMHO he can't do that for everything. And if the leak is true, then he is living in a hell of his own creation (well along with those who tried to protect him). And frankly I think the cries of "I am the victim" is primarily PR spin and deflection on this part.

And in all of this, at this point, for all we know the complainant might just be wanting this to go away as much as anyone. Maybe there was a pay off, maybe there wasn't and the complainant feels damaged enough and doesn't want to take the fight to the next level? It's not like the internal attempt at RB went well!

As they say, it's not the act, its the cover up (whitewashed results, etc. that are exposed by the leak) that gets you. If they had just come clean (as painful as that would have been) and created some type of punishment (CH is sidelined for a number of races, has to go through additional training, compensation to the complainant, etc.) but still kept his job, it would have been tough, but much less drama than what is happening now.

Originally Posted by Teretonga

How many of those ready to follow it and fling mud would want themselves outed and publicly identified for their comments about CH? Probably none of them.

Absolutely. I can also tell you I would absolutely not put myself into the position that he has!

Richard

[Sandgroper]

Originally Posted by peebee2

On the other hand, Mercedes need a new team leader, absolutely love Max Verstappen and have a virtually unlimited bag of money...

Stranger things have happened I guess.

[Skam85]

Originally Posted by peebee2

On the other hand, Mercedes need a new team leader, absolutely love Max Verstappen and have a virtually unlimited bag of money...

But isn't Generational Talent George "The next GOAT" Russell an absolutely elite option as team leader for the long-term future?

Why on earth would they chase Max and want to put new Kimi in their cars if that was the case, wouldn't they just get a solid peddler like Bottas??

Oh wait......

[Richard C]

https://www.motorsport-total.com/for...orner-24030303

Interesting article that talks to internal RB politics and how they might be a factor in how this situation with Horner is playing out.

Richard

[Teretonga]

Originally Posted by Richard C

In an infinite universe anything in possible. But of what part is he the victim? See my comments below.


I go back to my earlier post. Is this some deep plot by his enemies who planted a mole to be is PA and to seduce him so that he would provide incriminating evidence that could be used against him? It would make a great fictional movie. I am not convinced this is ALL a big conspiracy against him. I think the simple answer (which I call out below) is that he put himself into a bad position, it was exposed, handled poorly and his enemies are using it against him.
G

Debatable. The leak information continues to look real. I am still waiting on some evidence to the contrary.

Again possible. But no evidence. So that is as much fiction as anything


But it's not all speculation.


Frankly unrealistic expectations as to how you think he should be treated.


Who says the complainant is driving the current drama?

You may be appalled at this, but my speculation on this is as follows.

The leak information is true. It may be a snapshot of a larger story, but in itself it is damning. I think both CH and the complainant acted poorly. There was lots of flirty banter and insinuations of more than an emotional affair. No real evidence that anything was directly physical. I think the complainant let it go way too far before saying "no". And it looks like that saying no resulted in changes to the complainants work situation and/or the "controlling behavior" that was mentioned. Not to mention continued pushing by CH for inappropriate things. Here in the US that would qualify under the "severe or pervasive" threshold for sexual harassment. I imagine elsewhere uses similar.

So both were not particularly stellar examples of professional behavior. Then layer on top the power differential and you will see that CH would (in most professional and modern organizations) have a larger responsibility to behave correctly. It seems at some point the complainant decided to start documenting things. And that seems to have lead to the complaint. One thing that is lacking in the reporting on this topic is exactly what the RBR, RBPT and RB itself has put in place regarding policies on this topic. For example does it call out impropriety of manager and subordinate relationships? Or if it allows them, that they must be registered with HR so that they are not hidden? Why is nobody asking those questions?

Where things went sideways is that (again speculation here) CH is in a highly political environment in which various people are ready to take advantage of a situation like this. Layer in the speculation that there is a fissure at the RB ownership level on how to address this. Who knows what the report said. Lets say it says something like that above (and again we don't know policies and procedures they should be following). So I can imaging the investigation/report from the barrister provides the specifics, but does not define actions such as punishment or any other remediation (which I think would make sense). That would be left up to HR/Sr management. This is where we can speculate that it got extremely political at the top level of RB. Lets again speculate that the decision was made to keep Horner, but also might not have been particularly inline with the spirit of the internal policies. So we can pick apart the statement from Red Bull (my opinion is that it is VERY vaguely worded so it implies he was cleared, etc) but this may have triggered the leak.

So who leaked? Assuming the content is real (and again, nobody has shown otherwise and all involved have not disavowed it) then it is either Horner, the complainant or someone who had access to the content. I would vote it was someone (or some group) inside Red Bull that was not happy that Horner was going to remain so they went with the nuclear option and released the information. There are other permutations of this that might work as well. But it generally follows that it was trying to sink Horner.

So going on my theory above (which is inline with most of what is being talked about and pretty inline with the article posted earlier, but with me filling in some blanks) you can say that both CH and the complainant acted inappropriately and unprofessionally. With the much larger burden being on CH. So CH is NOT the victim in that part.

CH getting dragged through the mud publicly is unfortunate, embarrassing and damaging to his career. Is he a victim here? By the strict definition that he was harmed by an action, then yes. So I guess he can play the victim card. But IMHO he can't do that for everything. And if the leak is true, then he is living in a hell of his own creation (well along with those who tried to protect him). And frankly I think the cries of "I am the victim" is primarily PR spin and deflection on this part.

And in all of this, at this point, for all we know the complainant might just be wanting this to go away as much as anyone. Maybe there was a pay off, maybe there wasn't and the complainant feels damaged enough and doesn't want to take the fight to the next level? It's not like the internal attempt at RB went well!

As they say, it's not the act, its the cover up (whitewashed results, etc. that are exposed by the leak) that gets you. If they had just come clean (as painful as that would have been) and created some type of punishment (CH is sidelined for a number of races, has to go through additional training, compensation to the complainant, etc.) but still kept his job, it would have been tough, but much less drama than what is happening now.


Absolutely. I can also tell you I would absolutely not put myself into the position that he has!

Richard

Good to hear your comments, Richard.
But I think I will stick to my original feelings on the matter until this thing is really over.
Right now, I would stand by Horner, and I certainly don't trust an elder figure whose son is employed by CH.
The pattern of comment, speculation, and summary behavior by third parties are out of the ballpark.

I appreciate you think the images that came to light are real enough, but I don't feel the same way at all.
I'm not convinced that the narrative around the events following the Red Bull statement is factually correct.
I can understand why the FIA is concerned now because it stands to become an issue that spreads dirt all over F1, but I think it is the actions of others with other motives and agendas who are creating the slag.

[Skam85]

There's no doubt the images are real, it's just whether who sent them, or if they were ever sent at all are up for debate.

A few old man selfies, a bar video, a faceless hairy man nipple and a blurry finger (that is not a male member like someone said in this thread) can easily be distributed by someone that isn't CH.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by Teretonga

Good to hear your comments, Richard.
But I think I will stick to my original feelings on the matter until this thing is really over.
Right now, I would stand by Horner, and I certainly don't trust an elder figure whose son is employed by CH.
The pattern of comment, speculation, and summary behavior by third parties are out of the ballpark.

I appreciate you think the images that came to light are real enough, but I don't feel the same way at all.
I'm not convinced that the narrative around the events following the Red Bull statement is factually correct.
I can understand why the FIA is concerned now because it stands to become an issue that spreads dirt all over F1, but I think it is the actions of others with other motives and agendas who are creating the slag.

While I don't agree with all of the above, I do agree with some. I am assuming you are talking about comments from Jos? I think he is just in the group who want Horner gone and are opportunistically piling on.

Richard

[Teretonga]

Originally Posted by Richard C

While I don't agree with all of the above, I do agree with some. I am assuming you are talking about comments from Jos? I think he is just in the group who want Horner gone and are opportunistically piling on.

Richard

Yes.
In basis were not too far apart but the main difference is you accept the stuff revealed is real and await confirmation it is not.
I have more doubt and therefore don't accept it and await confirmation it is real!
It is really just the way we process and take a position on what we know so far.

[billy bleach]

Bored now does anybody care? He is not the first - I deed the King Of England sent salacious messages to Camilla! Its a private matter - not fodder for voyeurs