Christian Horner reveals that Lewis Hamilton was ‘very keen’ on joining Red Bull in the early 2010s

Horner claims the deal wasn't feasible due to Red Bull already having an alpha driver.

Christian Horner and Lewis Hamilton (Credits: News9Live and The Independent)

Driving out of Stevenage, Great Britain, Lewis Hamilton has emerged as whom many widely consider the greatest F1 driver of all time. Since joining Mercedes, his career has been littered with success and achievements, breaking several longstanding F1 records. However, Red Bull team boss Christian Horner has revealed that the Austrian team was in negotiations to sign Hamilton in the early 2010s.

Horner, when speaking to the media, revealed that Hamilton was very keen on joining the Red Bull garage between 2010 and 2013. However, the Briton admitted that the move never went through, as they had the rampaging prime Sebastian Vettel behind their wheel. Horner said that the dynamic wouldn’t have worked to pair up two domineering drivers at the time.

“There’s been a couple of occasions in history we’ve had a couple of conversations about the possibility of joining Red Bull, but that’s not been any time recently. From 2010 to 2013, he was very keen to come and drive for Red Bull. We had Sebastian at that time and to have had two alpha drivers wouldn’t have made sense,” confessed Christian Horner.

FS Video

Red Bull has not considered enticing him with an offer since. Still, one can only speculate what a blockbuster duo of Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel could have achieved together in the dominant Red Bull team of 2010 to 2013.

Red Bull played a pivotal role in facilitating Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes move

Lewis Hamilton embarked on his remarkable career at McLaren in 2007 and secured his first world title with the team in the subsequent year. However, in the following seasons, he was overshadowed by both Jenson Button and rising star Sebastian Vettel, who dominated the F1 scene. In a surprising turn of events, Hamilton boldly decided in 2013 to switch to Mercedes, a team that hadn’t experienced significant success in the sport until that point.

Astonishingly, Helmut Marko, advisor at Red Bull, recently disclosed that he played a role in facilitating Hamilton’s ambitious move to Mercedes. In an interview with Sport Bild, Marko revealed that he passed on information to Mercedes to help the move go through. He admitted he wasn’t being unselfish, hoping a move to an unproven team would render Hamilton less of a threat.

?️ | Marko admits that he made a huge mistake by advising Mercedes to sign Lewis Hamilton in late 2012

"I gave him (Lauda) some information that Lewis would be available. Of course I was not being altruistic."

"At the time, we thought Lewis would be less of a threat to us…" pic.twitter.com/TH7zuyi91l
— RBR Daily (@RBR_Daily) April 20, 2023

“I gave [Niki Lauda] some information that Lewis would be available. Of course I was not being altruistic. At the time, we thought Lewis would be less of a threat to us at Mercedes than McLaren, for whom he was driving at the time,“ revealed Helmut Marko.

He admitted that it turned out to be a misjudgment on his part, despite the unforeseeable consequences. Following his transition to Mercedes, Hamilton went on to disrupt Red Bull’s era of dominance and establish his own, capturing six out of the next seven possible championships.