Horner finally makes his debut as Red Bull F1 driver

©RedBull

Red Bull principal Christian Horner has finally achieved his ambition of driving one of the team's cars after taking the wheel of the 2012 RB8 for a run at Silverstone on Thursday.

Horner said that Sebastian Vettel had originally been scheduled to drive the cars but wasn't available due to a family holiday, leaving Horner to step in and perform the duties.

Before he became a team manager, Horner began his motorsport career as a driver in Formula 3000 but he found only limited success. He stopped racing in 1998 and by 2005 was in charge of the new Red Bull,.

That meant he oversaw Vettel's four world championship campaigns, including the one in 2012. He is also taking its predecessor, 2011's RB7 for a run at the Goodwood Festival of Speed

“It was fun. The first time I’ve driven a Red Bull F1 car and certainly the first time with a hand clutch and two pedals," he told the media at Goodwood, as reported by Reuters.

Read also: Horner reveals soul-crushing price tag of RB17 hypercar

“Sebastian Vettel was due to drive one of the cars here," he explained. “But he’s on holiday with his family and wasn’t able to make Goodwood, so the guys suggested why don’t you drive it?

"I haven’t driven a single-seater since 1998 and a Formula 1 car since 1993," he said, recalling his run out in a car that Lawrence Stroll (who now owns Aston Martin) had bought when he was a sponsor of the Lotus team.

"I thought there was an opportunity yesterday to drive a car with a hand clutch and a left-foot brake," Horner continued. “It was a great honour and a great privilege to drive one of these amazing cars, an F1 championship-winning car.

“It’s mind-boggling how quick these cars are and just how much aero influence there is,” Horner commented. “The biggest thing that struck me was when I lifted off, it’s like somebody’s thrown an anchor out.

“It’s like heavy braking in a road car. And then you hit the brakes and you’re struggling to keep your chin out of your chest," he described. "I enjoyed it so much I missed the pit lane and managed to squeeze in an extra lap."

That's the kind of poor discipline and lack of respect for team orders that could earn a driver a reprimand from his boss, but we think Horner will just about get away with it on this occasion.

"I will be Sebastian’s stand-in for the weekend here at Goodwood,” Horner added, which means that for the first time he will be Max Verstappen's "team mate", with the world champion also in action at Goodwood.

Sergio Perez will join the pair and be on hand to put on a display for fans at Britain's annual motor sport festival. After the Mexican struggled in last week's british GP, Horner declared the current situation was "unsustainable".

But with drivers including Yuki Tsunoda, Daniel Ricciardo and Liam Lawson all lined up in the event of any vacancy at Red Bull, it doesn't look like Horner is planning any long term vocational changes in that direction.

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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.