Max Verstappen has been buoyed by his first impression of Laurent Mekies as the new Red Bull boss as the team adapts to life without Christian Horner in Formula 1.
The Frenchman was immediately installed into Horner’s roles as both Team Principal and CEO, moving across from the satellite team Racing Bulls.
Mekies will now look to steer the Red Bull ship further towards steadier waters, amid a tricky 2025 season so far, which has seen Verstappen win just two races.
Verstappen, who also indicated Horner’s departure will make no difference to whether he will stay with the team or not, said he already had “quite a few meetings” with Mekies.
When asked about the details of the meetings ahead of this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix, Verstappen was tight-lipped but had nothing but positive words for his new boss.
“We’ll keep that between ourselves, of course, what I want to focus on,” he told media including Motorsport Week.
“He’s incredibly motivated and I like that. You can see the fire. It’s new in the role, but, yeah, it’s exciting.”
Mekies’ various F1 roles will be ‘helpful’ as he takes on Red Bull mantle
Verstappen was then probed on whether Mekies can make the same stamp on the team Horner managed, given both men have very different backgrounds.
Horner, a driver who retired young and went into team management early, differs entirely from Mekies, whose background is firmly on the engineering side.
“Time will tell,” Verstappen replied. “I cannot say right now, within two weeks of no action on track that suddenly everything is different or better, but we are trying to be better and we are trying to work on that.”
But regardless, the Dutchman has been encouraged by Mekies as a person, and believes his various roles – having been involved in F1 since 2001, including stints at teams such as Ferrari – will be a benefit to Red Bull.
Verstappen said his first impressions of Mekies have “been good,” adding: “I like Laurent. He’s a very nice guy, first of all, very clever guy.
“He’s been in different areas of the F1 paddock as well. And I think that can be helpful.”
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