The departure of the long term Chief Technology Officier for Red Bull has raised quite the noise in the Formula 1 paddock. After 19 seasons and seven championships with the Milton Keynes-based team, Adrian Newey has stepped down from his role of genius behind the making of some of the most dominant cars ever seen in the history of the championship.
Even more rumours are spreading regarding his next destination, with Ferrari and Aston Martin apparently in for the Englishman, who will spend his gardening leave working on Red Bull’s first ever Hypercar project.
Many drivers and notable F1 personalities have been asked for their opinion on what will be Newey’s next move after three championships in a row with the Bulls, including Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
While praising the clever men and women employed by the Scuderia, the Monegasque driver admitted that it would be an incredible opportunity for him to have the chance to work with Newey, as he said on media day ahead of the Miami Grand Prix:
“I will obviously be very happy, I think Adrian is one of those guys in the paddock that you hope to be working with one day in your career. We have an incredible team in Ferrari at the moment and in the last seven to eight months we are the team that has progressed the most, however adding Adrian to a team like this would be amazing.”
Asked if he believes that Ferrari has become more attractive as a team in the past year, following the signings of many illustrious talents, as well as persuading seven-times World Champion Lewis Hamilton to join, Leclerc agreed.
“For sure, I think I’ve said it in the last eight to nine months already, I think we’re in a very good moment for the team and we are in a good spiral.”
“Fred has always shared with me what was his medium to long-term vision of the team, I have shared with him what I thought also was the right thing and it’s going really really well, I’m really happy with how it goes and I think we are in a good place to attract the best people in the world.”
He was also adamant on highlighting the progress made over the past season even before the ‘big’ signings, as the only team outside of Red Bull to have won a Grand Prix since the beginning of 2023.
“However I have said it already but we are a really really good team already and in the last seven to eight months we’ve done incredible progress. Whatever and whoever can come to make it even stronger is super important and Adrian is one of those guys that can make a difference.”
The news dropped rather unexpectedly on the 30th anniversary of Ayrton Senna’s death. It surprised the whole racing world, including the Ferrari driver:
“I mean I was surprised, I did not expect it, so it was an interesting news and one of those news that makes a lot of noise once it’s out as I had it everywhere on my social media. Will it weaken Red Bull? I mean obviously every team there are lots of people involved, but some figures of a team makes more difference than others.
“I think Adrian is definitely one of them, as he has shown it with his path that every time he’s been in a team they’ve been very very successful. It’s difficult for me to comment because I don’t know how exactly it works within the team, but obviously Adrian being on the market of the engineers is definitely someone to watch and someone that everybody in the paddock will want in their team,” he concluded.
