Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsRed Bull Racing

Horner calls for Brawn to replace 'inept' Strategy Group

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Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has described the Strategy Group as "inept" and has called for a figure such as Ross Brawn to help decide F1's future direction.

The Austrian Grand Prix was a fairly unspectacular race in terms of on track battles, while grid penalties drew criticism as both McLaren drivers were faced with 25-place drops on a grid of 20 cars. With Horner calling for F1 to "get back to the basics", he says nothing is being agreed through the Strategy Group.

"I think the Strategy Group is fairly inept," Horner says. "I keep saying it and I will repeat it again now: It is the commercial rights holder and the governing body to decide what F1 should be and then put it on the table to the teams and say ‘this is what we want the product to be, these are the rules, this is the entry form’."

Asked if there could be input from the Sporting Working Group, Horner says he would like to see someone such as Brawn - who was Ferrari technical boss in the early 2000s and later Mercedes team principal - to take an overall look at F1.

"The results of the Sporting Working Group is the penalties we are seeing [in Austria], that become too complex. The technical working group is the engine rules that we have so take it out of those groups, come up with a product and then place it in front of the teams.

"Maybe you need an independent, someone not involved, someone like Ross Brawn that understands the challenges, knows the business, to write a specification for what a car or technical regulations should be."

Click here for the gallery of Raikkonen and Alonso's crash at the Austrian Grand Prix

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.