Aston Martin announced Adrian Newey as their new team principal while rumors swirled about Christian Horner possibly taking the helm. Adrian, one of the greatest car designers in Formula 1 history, will be the new team principal for 2026.
Many wonder if the internal moves are making room for a CEO role for Horner if the team is done making management shuffles for next year. Was this always the plan? Not according to Fernando Alonso who said when asked if he saw this change coming:
“Not really. We were discussing more technical stuff about the car than any other thing or future dreams, but yeah, it’s good news.
“He was, anyway, managing in a way the technical development of the car, but also the team, the people that were needed and taking care of which areas we need to reinforce as a team, which other areas were less important.
“So, in a way, he was doing internally a lot of management and Andy was doing a lot of management as well on the engine side and engine integration to the chassis. It was maybe a normal logic step into 2026.”
The interesting move might be a new challenge for Newey who will not be managing people and one might wonder how much time he has to design the car and upgrades during the season. Who will do all of the people management functions a team principal normally does? If you were hedging your bets, perhaps you might still see a role for a new team CEO and perhaps you might feel that Horner would be the best fit.
Some suggest that Newey may not be favorable of hiring Horner and working for him again but it’s hard to know what the relationship is between the two with any certainty.
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If Horner were to be hired as CEO, just leave Newey alone and let him do his thing.