F1 News: Red Bull announce organizational changes

Oracle Red Bull Racing dropped a press release this morning announcing a handful of tweaks in its technical department. Effective immediately, long-time insider Ben Waterhouse (pictured on left with Laurent Mekies and Pierre Wache) has been bumped up to Chief Performance and Design Engineer, taking overarching responsibility for both Design and Vehicle Performance while still reporting to Technical Director Pierre Wache.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

From 1 July, Andrea Landi — previously Deputy Head of Vehicle Performance at Ferrari and Deputy Technical Director at sister team VCARB — will join as Head of Performance, reporting to Waterhouse.

The team’s statement reads like classic corporate fluff: “aimed at reinforcing its focus on performance and innovation… strengthening integration between these areas… accelerating the development of competitive, high-performing solutions… developing internal talent while attracting leading expertise from across the sport.”

Translation: we’re promoting one of our own guys and nicking a mid-level engineer from our B-team (and Ferrari before that). Move along, nothing to see here.

Except there’s plenty to see — if you’ve been paying attention for the last three years.

While Red Bull was busy patting itself on the back and issuing press releases about “long-term technical ambitions,” its actual top talent was walking out the door.

Adrian Newey, the man who designed the cars that won them seven drivers’ titles and six constructors’ crowns, left at the start of 2025 for Aston Martin. Chief Designer
Craig Skinner was gone by February this year.
Rob Marshall jumped to McLaren back in 2023.
Jonathan Wheatley,
Will Courtenay and a string of other senior technical and operational figures have followed.
Max Verstappen race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase is heading for the exit in 2028. The brain drain has been relentless.
Verstappen’s long-time chief mechanic is already gone

And what did Red Bull’s leadership do while rivals were circling and poaching their best people? Sat there with their thumbs up their a$$es, apparently convinced the Milton Keynes magic was bulletproof and the champagne would keep flowing forever.

This isn’t a bold reset. It’s a reactive scramble after the damage has already been done. Waterhouse is a solid, experienced Red Bull lifer who’s been there since the Toro Rosso days, and Landi clearly knows his stuff. But promoting from within and grabbing one guy from Faenza doesn’t magically replace the institutional knowledge, aerodynamic genius and championship pedigree that just got cherry-picked by McLaren, Aston Martin and others.

The timing makes it even more pathetic. We’re in April 2026. The new regulations are in full swing. Every team is fighting tooth and nail over every last tenth. Red Bull, once the undisputed kings of design and performance, have already slipped into the midfield this season. And now — after watching their crown jewels leave one by one — they announce… a reshuffle of the remaining deck chairs.

This is what happens when complacency sets in. You spend years building the best technical operation in the sport, then you let it erode because you’re too busy with internal politics, sponsor launches and pretending everything’s fine. Rivals didn’t wait around. They went out and bought the talent Red Bull let slip through their fingers.

So spare us the glossy statement about “strengthening the Team’s long-term technical ambitions.” The ambitions look a lot more like damage limitation right now.

Whether these changes are enough to stop the slide under the 2026 rules is anyone’s guess. But if the last few seasons have taught us anything, it’s this: you don’t rebuild a championship-winning technical department by waiting until half your best people have already left — then issuing a press release pretending it was all part of the plan.