The Red Bull F1 Racing team is in a total mess right now.

The Red Bull F1 Racing team is in a total mess right now.

Right now, the Red Bull F1 Racing team is a complete wreck. There was a Formula 1 Grand Prix this past weekend, and there will be another one this coming weekend, in case you were unaware.

There are still motor races taking place, despite how easily this might be forgotten given the volume of non-racing news, headlines, and rumors that have enveloped the F1 circus during its first week of operation.

But one of the stories is about something far more significant than auto racing. As Frontstretch alum Elizabeth Blackstock noted in her blog regarding the main issue in this, the Christian Horner affair, there is and has been a glaring power imbalance in the F1 paddock.

I linked to Elizabeth’s work not because I think it’s excellent—which it is, in any case—but rather because I, a white man, can’t do the subject right. I’m not harassed at the racetrack because of my gender, and I don’t have to “prove” that I’m a “real reporter/fan” or that I understand what’s going on.

The fact that anyone of any gender or background may work in motorsports in any job is one of its genuinely lovely aspects. To establish a friendly environment where everyone can enter and succeed if they have the talent, more should be asked of the leaders at the top of the pyramid. Although we have come a long way in the last few years, it is still insufficient.

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as this entire Horner fiasco demonstrates. Following Red Bull’s dismissal of the complaint last week, all of the senior executives at FOM, the FIA, and the accredited media were emailed a link to a Google Drive containing 79 photos labeled as “evidence.”

Clearly, the primary reason these photographs have not been released by any significant news outlet besides legal ones is that they are not entirely verifiable. By all accounts, if they are fakes, they are quite good fakes. It’s still impossible to confirm, though, that this is essentially a compilation of WhatsApp communications.

However, the individual who sent this email to everyone in secret also had the connections to possess all of those email accounts. For example, I don’t believe Toto Wolff’s email address is toto@mercedes.com; he’s only one of the high-profile recipients of these materials.

To be clear, if this was the woman making these accusations, it would be unexpected. Do you recall her? She is not a tool; she is a real person. If she were to contest this after the investigation is complete, the disclosure of this kind seriously jeopardizes her legal position.

Following the race, which Max Verstappen won handily, Jos Verstappen, the older Verstappen, went to the Daily Mail and made a more overt attempt to break Horner’s hold on Red Bull:
It almost seems to speak for itself that the Dutch newspaper de Telegraaf, which has been close to Jos since his days as a Formula 1 racer, broke this story in the first place.

For his part, Jos Verstappen has refuted any claims that he leaked the Google Drive or the tale.

Additionally, let’s not reward the elder Verstappen with a bottle of champagne and a wreath just because he might have done the right thing. This is a man who allegedly ran over his girlfriend, abused his former wife, and once abandoned his young son at a gas station when Max was not able to win a karting championship.

If there’s a Red Bull civil war on the horizon, heads will roll one way or another.

And then there is Mohammed Ben Sulayem, the president of the FIA, who is currently under investigation for various cases of power abuse. Not that he wasn’t reportedly urging Max Verstappen in private to publicly back Horner this past weekend.