Christian Horner Advises Max Verstappen to ‘Roll Up His Sleeves’ With Stronger Opposition Ready to Dethrone Him

Tanish Chachra | 06/01/2025
Max Verstappen (Red Bull Racing) celebrates winning his fourth world title with Christian Horner (Red Bull Racing) after the Las Vegas Grand Prix

Max Verstappen has been reigning the world championship over the last four seasons. But the decay in his empire can be seen as he struggled to seal the title in 2024. McLaren and Ferrari have improved rapidly and have ended Red Bull’s hegemony in the ground-effect era.

So, with the 2025 season set to have a lot more competition, Verstappen is certain to face difficulties in defending his world championship. That’s why Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has advised the Dutchman to ‘roll up his sleeves’ ahead of the new season.

“2021 was all about two drivers (Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton ), in 2022 we were untouchable once we got going and 2023 was a unique year. Now Max has had to roll up his sleeves and work hard for the championship. He’s driven brilliantly,” said Horner in an interview with RacingNews365.

Verstappen is not aloof from the complications he is about to face. Recently, he argued that if the next season starts similar to the second half of last year, then winning the championship wouldn’t be possible.

Adding further, the 2025 season wouldn’t be high on Red Bull’s bingo card. With the new regulations coming up in 2026, the Milton Keynes-based outfit would be more focused on that task, provided since January 1st, teams have been allowed to work on the new regulations.

Though Verstappen has guaranteed that if Red Bull provides a car that’s competitive enough, then the rest can be laid on him to achieve.

The pressure is on Verstappen’s teammate

The biggest news Red Bull has given lately is the signing of Liam Lawson as the second driver at Red Bull. The Kiwi driver is replacing Sergio Perez, who compared to Verstappen was nowhere to be seen in last year’s standings.

Verstappen has indeed been much better than all of his teammates at Red Bull ever since Daniel Ricciardo left. So, the pressure to keep up with the four-time world champion is on Lawson.

The Red Bull academy driver was already in contention with Yuki Tsunoda for the much sought-after seat. So much so, that several experts and fans disagree with Lawson’s promotion.

Not to forget, Horner himself claimed Tsunoda is in the pipeline if Lawson fails to perform in 2025. So, the Hastings-born driver will have to hit the ground running, come what may, especially given the struggles he has faced to reach the pinnacle of motorsport.

Post Edited By: Aishwary Gaonkar
Christian Horner Max Verstappen Red Bull

About the author

Tanish Chachra

Tanish Chachra is the Motorsport editor at The SportsRush. He saw his first race when F1 visited India in 2011, and since then, his romance with the sport has been seasonal until he took up this role in 2020. Reigniting F1's coverage on this site, Tanish has fallen in love with the sport all over again. He loves Kimi Raikkonen and sees a future world champion in Oscar Piastri. Away from us, he loves to snuggle inside his books.

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