As much as Red Bull would insist that their driver line-up is the most secure on the current grid – with world champion Max Verstappen under contract until the end of the 2028 season and Sergio Perez having been given a new deal which includes at least an option for him to be retained for 2026 – the reality is anything but.
Aside from Perez firing the rumour mill into overdrive with repeated disappointing performances virtually every grand prix weekend, even Verstappen has not been immune from speculation over his future.
The internal political struggles that engulfed the team at the start of the season have clearly not been welcomed by their world champion driver, while Toto Wolff appears not to have given up on trying to convince him to jump ship to Mercedes.
But it’s clearly Perez, 146 points behind his team mate at the summer break, whose seat is hottest. Despite only putting pen to paper with him a matter of months ago, rumours were rampant after a sequence of bad weekends leading into the summer break that Red Bull might cut their losses and replace him with either Daniel Ricciardo or Yuki Tsunoda.
That was until yesterday, when team principal Christian Horner sought to cease all speculation by confirming that Perez would remain in his seat for the upcoming Dutch Grand Prix and beyond.
That came as a surprise to many not due to Perez’s performance, but because Red Bull have not hesitated to cut those who didn’t measure up in the past, as these six cases show.
2005-6 – Car swap carousel
Red Bull Racing’s inaugural season in 2005 was more successful than most might have expected. The team hired veteran David Coulthard after his nine-year tenure at McLaren, but as well as experience, they wanted to offer opportunity for youth too.
Their solution was to hand their second seat to rookie and F3000 champion Vitantonio Liuzzi. And also to its previous occupant, Christian Klien.
For the first seven rounds, Liuzzi and Klien rotated racing duties between them. While Klien competed in the opening three rounds in Melbourne, Sepang and Bahrain, Liuzzi performed Friday practice duties. Then over the following four rounds at Imola, Barcelona, Monaco and the Nurburging, the roles were reversed. Eventually, after the European Grand Prix at the Nurburgring, the team decided that Klien would race out the remainder of the championship, while Liuzzi would share Friday duties with Scott Speed.
Liuzzi was rewarded the following season with a race seat alongside Speed at Red Bull’s new Toro Rosso junior team, while Klien remained alongside Coulthard at the senior team. However, Klien lasted until that year’s Italian Grand Prix. After scoring only two points to Coulthard’s 14 over the first 15 rounds, Klien was replaced by Robert Doornbos for the final three races.
For their third season in 2007, Red Bull decided they needed two experienced drivers, and signed Mark Webber to join Coulthard instead.
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2007 – So long, Speed
With two teams came double the opportunities for Red Bull to get aggressive with their driver line-ups. American driver Scott Speed was one half of the first Toro Rosso line up alongside Liuzzi in 2006, but the team only scored a single point all season, courtesy of Liuzzi at Indianapolis.
The following season, the points were no easier to come by. But tension brewed between Speed and team principal Franz Tost as their personalities appeared to clash. Eventually, at that year’s European Grand Prix, things came to a head when the pair got into a heated argument after Speed was one of several drivers to aquaplane off the track when rain hit at the start of the race.
By the next race in Hungary, Speed’s time with the team was over. In his car instead was an exciting Red Bull junior prospect by the name of Sebastian Vettel…
2009 – Bye, bye, Bourdais
The prospect of multiple ChampCar champion Sebastien Bourdais entering Formula 1 was an exciting one. Red Bull gave the ChampCar veteran a chance to test his skills in the world championship in 2008, but he was soundly beaten by Vettel over the season, who even went on to record a memorable grand prix victory in the heavy rain that year in Monza.
Bourdais was given a second chance with the team in 2009, with a young rookie and fellow Sebastien joining the team in Sebastien Buemi. Again, Bourdais was outshone by his younger team mate – not quite what was expected of an experienced single-seater champion like Bourdais.
Eventually, after the German Grand Prix, Red Bull took the bold step of replacing Bourdais with 19-year-old Jaime Alguersuari – who became F1’s youngest ever debutant at the next round in Hungary.
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2016 – Kvyat replaced after round four
After several years of stability at Red Bull with Vettel and Webber, then Daniel Ricciardo replacing his retiring countryman, Vettel would depart for Ferrari for the 2015 season, giving Red Bull their youngest ever driver line up as Daniil Kvyat was promoted over Jean-Eric Vergne into the main team.
But all the focus was on Toro Rosso, who boasted an all-new driver line-up oozing with promise and star potential. First was 20-year-old Carlos Sainz Jnr the son of the multiple World Rally champion. But in a controversial move, Sainz’s team mate was 17-year-old Max Verstappen – the youngest driver ever to be granted a Formula 1 superlicence.
Both drivers impressed in their first season in the sport. But as Red Bull were unable to compete for regular wins and the championship as they wished to, Kvyat’s lack of polish at times did not inspire confidence. As the 2016 season began, prospects began to look up for Kvyat as he took a podium finish in the third round of the championship in China.
However, at his home grand prix in Russia at the very next round, Kvyat had a shocker. He crashed into Vettel’s Ferrari twice in two corners, ending up in 15th place with a damaged car. Before the next round in Spain, Red Bull stunned the motorsport world by announcing that Kvyat and Verstappen would be switched, with Kvyat relegated back to Toro Rosso and Verstappen promoted into his seat at Red Bull.
Those who criticised the move were silenced when Verstappen promptly won his first race with the team after the dominant Mercedes pair crashed out, becoming the youngest ever grand prix winner aged just 18. He remains in that same seat to this day, while Kvyat later lost his Toro Rosso seat before the end of the next season to Pierre Gasly and Brendon Hartley.
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2019 – Gasly out, Albon in
As Verstappen grew in stature at Red Bull, team mate Ricciardo found himself questioning whether this was the team which would give him the best chance of pursuing his dream of a world championship title. As a result, he decided to leave Red Bull at the end of the 2018 season and commit his future to Renault.
Unsurprisingly, Red Bull opted to look within for Ricciardo’s replacement, rather than sign someone from a rival team. Out of the two Toro Rosso candidates in 2018, Gasly was the clear best choice.
Gasly was therefore promoted into the senior squad alongside Verstappen, while Red Bull junior Alexander Albon was given a Toro Rosso chance alongside Kvyat, who had been brought back to help provide experience to the second team. But unlike Ricciardo, who had been fairly evenly matched with Verstappen, Gasly completely struggled to keep up with him.
Over the first 12 rounds of the championship, Gasly failed to beat Verstappen on merit a single time in qualifying or races. Verstappen fought for victories, won races and took pole positions, while Gasly failed to complete a single lap in the top three positions. Gasly was also lapped by Verstappen on multiple occasions.
While Gasly went into the summer break eager to reset, Red Bull did not give him that chance. Instead, they announced they would be picking Albon to replace him for the rest of the season, rather than Kvyat. While the pair had been reasonably evenly matched, Red Bull assumed Albon provided more upside long term.
It appeared to be the right decision. Over the final nine rounds of the season, Albon amassed 76 points with the team – 11 more than Gasly had scored over the first 12.
2021 – Red Bull picks Perez
Although Albon appeared to show much more promise than Gasly over the final part of the previous season, he failed to build on that level of performance the following year.
While Verstappen was regularly on the podium, Albon only reached it twice. He never out-qualified car number 33 across the entire season and was never the first Red Bull to the chequered flag in races where they both finished. Although Horner recognised that Albon was still closer to Verstappen on average than Gasly had been, Red Bull were starting to threaten Mercedes more regularly and the team needed a driver who they could rely on in the heat of a championship battle.
At the end of the season, they picked Sergio Perez as that driver. Losing his seat at Racing Point ahead of its transition to Aston Martin, Perez had hit the best form of his life and had just celebrated a maiden grand prix victory in his tenth season in Formula 1. Albon was retained as the team’s reserve and simulator driver for 2021, serving a vital role as Red Bull became locked in a fierce championship fight with Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton – which Perez played a crucial part in helping Verstappen to prevail in.
Red Bull were happy to reward Albon for his team work by releasing him to return to the grid with Williams in 2022. Albon has become a key part of Williams’ rebuilding. But while Perez continues to race alongside Verstappen, the gulf between the pair only seems to have widened over time, yet for once Red Bull have stayed their hand.
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