Horner: 'Newey nearly bankrupted Aston Martin'
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Adrian Newey was somewhat less involved in the Formula 1 project a few years ago when he moved more into developing the Aston Martin Valkyrie. The end result was fantastic, but the costs were skyrocketing at some point. Red Bull Racing team boss Christian Horner says Newey caused Aston Martin to almost go bankrupt.
How serious Horner's words are is hard to say. What we do know is that in those years things were not necessarily going very well for car manufacturer Aston Martin, then title sponsor of Red Bull's Formula 1 team, so there may just be some grain of truth in the 49-year-old Briton's statements.
"It was a very different experience, because working with an OEM (original equipment manufacturer, ed.), even a small OEM like Aston, obviously cost is absolutely driven into anything in everything they do," said Horner, who saw Newey and his creative mind pay very little attention to that.
Horner continued: "And of course, we’ve got Adrian Newey, who probably doesn’t know where our finance department even is!", he laughed in an interview with The Financial Times. "He created an incredible, incredible car, that almost bankrupted Aston Martin! But I mean, it is an absolute gem of a car."
Red Bull learned a lot from building Valkyrie
In the king class of motorsport, Newey has to abide by the technical regulations drawn up by the FIA, but the Valkyrie has to comply with all the rules to actually be allowed on the road. "And many lessons of course, we have a set of regulations in Formula 1, but they’re nothing like the road stipulations and regulations, so it was a huge learning exercise from that side of things. And yeah, it was an interesting exercise and one that the Advanced Technology side of our business learned a huge amount from, and I think will stand us in good stead for the future", Horner said.