FIA on the boos for Verstappen, Horner at F1 75 event

The FIA have released a statement regarding the crowd’s reaction toward Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Christian Horner during the F1 75 car livery launch last week. As I stated in my review of the event, I found the boos out of place, given the spirit of the evening, and in poor taste.

For detractors, they might suggest that Max, Christian and Red Bull deserve their ire and that every sport has a villain. The supporters might suggest that it’s outrageous and lacks respect for the team and its personnel.

The FIA weighed in with their own thoughts:

FIA Statement:

“Great rivalries throughout the history of motorsport have contributed to making it such an exciting experience for fans,” an FIA spokesperson said.

“But what underpins sport at all levels is a culture of respect. As such, it was disappointing to hear the crowd’s tribalist reaction to FIA Formula 1 World Champion Max Verstappen and his Red Bull Team Principal and CEO Christian Horner, at the F1 launch in London.

“Max and Christian have both contributed greatly to the sport we love. In the season ahead we should not lose sight of that.

“As part of the FIA’s commitment to protect the integrity of the sport, we are leading a coalition tackling online abuse in sport under the banner of our United Against Online Abuse campaign.

“We stand with all of our competitors, officials, volunteers, and fans to unite against this growing threat. We urge the sporting community to consider the impact of their actions both online and offline.”

I felt the evening was meant as a celebration of the teams, the liveries, the drivers and the start of the 2025 season and thus, the boos and disdain was misplaced for the spirit of the event. There were even some soft boos for Lance Stroll as well.

Maybe its just me but I would never attend an event such as that and actually boo a driver or team I didn’t particularly care for. The event was celebrating the teams, personnel, sponsors and liveries and I think we can all be glad for that combination which make F1 tick.

Perhaps a more revealing moment that reflects the fanbase who bought tickets, was when Lewis Hamilton was announced in Ferrari red. You’d think that entire arena had been lifelong Ferrari fans and yet they spent the last 10+ years demonizing Ferrari as they were competitors of Lewis’s. Even Mercedes had a Luke warm reception now that Lewis isn’t there.

This isn’t an indictment of Lewis, just an observation. However, I said it before when Red Bull was being denied an engine from Mercedes and Ferrari and many of the same fans suggested Red Bull should simply leave the sport. That is a colossal failure to understand just how important that team, Christian Horner, Helmut Marko, Dietrich Mateschit and the entire Red Bull organization are to F1.

You may not like Max beating Lewis, or his driving and you may not like the way 2021 ended but Red Bull were here long before 2021 and they done an amazing job in F1 and for F1. When Williams, McLaren and Sauber were all on life support, Red Bull was killing it and investing heavily into F1. As the largest privateer in the series at the time, I found these dismissive comments back then very odd.

Now, let me also suggest that Red Bull has some ownership in this brand damage they’ve experienced as well. All the happenings last year were muted and quickly dismissed. Jos Verstappen isn’t helping matters and the departures of key personnel have also hurt in trying to get out in front of the negative publicity.

Red Bull needed to own their bad news and get out in front of the messaging on this issue. Crisis PR rules would have helped quite a bit here.

If none of it was true, then get out ahead of it and unequivocally set the messaging around the specious allegations. If it was true, then I’d argue that Christian might have considered moving to team CEO and promoting Jonathan Whitley to team boss position. Remove the controversy and let Horner work on the P&L, balance sheet, resource allocation, sponsor development and management. Let Jonathan manage the race team and pit wall.

As for Max, as I’ve stated before, his father isn’t helping him, its just adding stress to the situation. Max’s worst crime was benefitting from the 2021 Abu Dhabi decision and his aggressive nature. Fair enough, some like it, some don’t. Schumacher gave up trying to please the British press and fans and my guess is, Max has done the same.