Just three weeks remain for the 2024 F1 season to begin and there is a lot of chatter about the driver market. We have already witnessed a major driver transfer with Lewis Hamilton switching to Ferrari for 2025. This transfer has also opened up the driver market for a chaotic silly season. On the other hand, there has been some controversy at Red Bull with their long-standing team boss Christian Horner. As things stand, Horner is still the team principal of the champion outfit, even though that could change. Regardless, here is a list of all the 10 F1 team principals for the 2024 season.
Christian Horner – Red Bull
Christian Horner has been the team principal of Red Bull Racing ever since its inception in 2005. He is currently the longest-serving team boss in F1 after Franz Tost retired from being AlphaTauri/Toro Rosso’s team boss at the end of last year. Horner has been one of the key leadership pillars for Red Bull, contributing to their dominant success in F1.
The streak of four consecutive championships from 2010 to 2013 and the current streak of titles since 2022 is undoubtedly great for the Briton’s resume. However, the recent controversy of “cross-border behavior” against a Red Bull Racing employee may become an ugly chapter in Horner’s story.
As per the latest updates, the investigation by Red Bull is going on and may go on for weeks before they decide on Horner’s fate.
Toto Wolff – Mercedes
Toto Wolff can be considered one of the star personalities of the F1 paddock. Wolff is the team principal and CEO of the Mercedes F1 team. Besides being the boss, the Austrian also owns a 33% stake in the team alongside other stakeholders like INEOS and Mercedes-Benz themselves.
Thus, Wolff is an integral part of the Silver Arrows and not just their team principal. Currently, the 52-year-old is facing a big personnel challenge, with his lead driver Lewis Hamilton jumping ship for next season. Thus, the Mercedes boss has to assess options for Hamilton’s 2025 replacement.
Frederic Vasseur – Ferrari
Frederic Vasseur got his big promotion last year by becoming the team principal of Scuderia Ferrari. Having served as the team boss at Sauber/Alfa Romeo previously, Vasseur’s managerial and leadership ability was never in question. At Ferrari, it got further validation with the way he handled things.
Vasseur is now aiming to bring glory back to the Italian outfit. For the same, the Frenchman has made some huge moves, including signing Hamilton for 2025.
Besides, Vasseur also ensured to extend Charles Leclerc‘s stay at Maranello “for several seasons”. The 55-year-old seems ambitious and aggressive to lead the Prancing Horse to the F1 championship after a 17-year hiatus.
Andrea Stella – McLaren
In the same merry-go-round of team principals at the end of 2022, when Fred Vasseur got the Ferrari role, Andrea Stella got the promotion at McLaren. Having served as the Performance and Racing director, the Woking team trusted in Stella’s leadership abilities.
And their trust was repaid when the Italian led their fantastic in-season turnaround in 2023. Stella is now aiming to boost McLaren into race-winning and championship-winning contention. He has assembled a potent technical team of key engineering recruits from Red Bull and Ferrari. This may help the Papaya team to build on their 2023 momentum.
Mike Krack – Aston Martin
Mike Krack undertook the team principal role at Aston Martin when the team was in turmoil in 2022. From there on, Krack has managed and led the team brilliantly to boost them into podium contention.
With their technical chief Dan Fallows’ brilliance and owner Lawrence Stroll’s investment, Krack is developing Aston Martin well. Whether he can become as successful as Toto Wolff or Christian Horner, only time will tell. For now, his leadership is showing results on the track.
Bruno Famin – Alpine
After an unceremonious axing of Otmar Szafnauer midway through last year, Bruno Famin became the interim team boss at Alpine. Before joining the French team, Famin worked with Peugeot Sport and even the FIA.
His original role at Alpine was overseeing the overall engine development for all of the brand’s motorsport programs. After the chaotic restructuring, he got involved in a more hands-on capacity in the F1 team. Currently, Famin is serving both of his roles – the VP of Alpine Motorsport as well as the team principal for Alpine F1.
James Vowles – Williams
From being famous for “Valtteri, it’s James” radio messages at Mercedes to having a great debut year as the Williams team principal, James Vowles has had the full circle in F1. Vowles has done a fantastic job of pushing a backmarker team like Williams to finish P7 last season.
In the long term too, Vowles is trying his best to upgrade the infrastructure at the Grove-based team to make them competitive once again. Knowing the insights into how a top championship team works, the former Mercedes strategy director is implementing all that wisdom at Williams.
Alessandro Alumni-Bravi – Sauber
After Fred Vasseur’s exit, Sauber have not exactly appointed a team principal. Alessandro Alumni-Bravi is their team representative whose role is more or less the same as a team principal, just not his designation. In their stop-gap team rebrand as Stake F1, Sauber is looking to gear up for their big Audi takeover in 2026.
Besides former McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl, who is the team’s CEO, Alumni-Bravi is managing things well at the Swiss team. At their 2024 car launch, Alumni-Bravi gave an idea of how the team is adopting a bold and aggressive approach for 2024 and 2025. They would hope it works well for them to become competitive alongside Audi post-2026.
Laurent Mekies – V-CARB
After leaving his role as sporting director at Ferrari, Laurent Mekies signed up for a promotion as team principal at AlphaTauri, now rebranded as V-CARB. Mekies is looking to lead the Faenza-based team under its new name with some great ambition.
Similar to James Vowles, Mekies is no stranger to how a top F1 outfit works. Thus, to boost RB into the midfield, his past experience will be handy. Alongside some other key names such as Alan Permane (from Alpine) and Tim Goss (from the FIA), Mekies has got great leadership support to improve V-CARB.
Ayao Komatsu – Haas
Having a core engineering background, Ayao Komatsu has been working in F1 for over two decades. At Haas, the Japanese engineer served as the chief race engineer initially before becoming the trackside engineering director.
After Guenther Steiner’s sudden sacking, Komatsu was promoted to the team principal role in January 2024. Certainly, Gene Haas trusts in his merit and leadership abilities. However, Komatsu has given some deflating but realistic statements on how the American team may struggle in the initial part of 2024.
For the long term, he is looking to make a technical overhaul of the team. This should ideally help them get better effective upgrades, something Haas has always struggled with.
