Christian Horner reveals when Red Bull’s F1 decline started – and it’s not even this year

Red Bull have not won since Barcelona but Horner says it was last year’s Spanish GP where the issues started

Christian Horner says Red Bull have traced their decline all the way back to the 2023 Spanish Grand Prix last June, despite the dozen-plus races Max Verstappen won after that event.

Verstappen claimed victory at last year’s race in Barcelona, with the Dutchman going on to win a further 14 races to cap off a record-breaking 2023 campaign as he claimed his third-straight F1 world title.

Red Bull’s star driver also won four of the first five races this year before McLaren stormed back into contention. Following Oscar Piastri’s win in Azerbaijan on Sunday, the papaya have leapfrogged Red Bull in the constructors’ standings and lead the way by 20 points.

However, Horner insists it was race seven of 22 last year which saw Red Bull make their first error, but the team didn’t take it seriously “because Max kept winning.”

“We traced the development history back and it turned out that the first mistake we made was with an underbody upgrade in 2023 in Barcelona,” Horner told German outlet Auto Motor und Sport.

“That was also the grand prix from which Checo started having problems with the car. We just didn’t take it so seriously because Max kept winning.”

Verstappen won last year’s race in Barcelona by 24 seconds to Lewis Hamilton in second, while Perez finished fourth behind George Russell.

That win in Barcelona was Verstappen’s third victory in a run of 10 consecutive triumphs before Carlos Sainz ended Red Bull’s win streak in Singapore.

However, Verstappen is now winless in seven races and saw Lando Norris cut his advantage in the drivers’ championship to 59 points in Baku with seven races remaining.

Verstappen started in sixth, nine places ahead of Norris, but finished in fifth and a spot behind the McLaren driver.

Christian Horner has pinpointed the start of Red Bull’s struggles back to last year’s Spanish Grand Prix (Getty Images)

Verstappen won last year’s race in Barcelona by 24 seconds (Getty Images)

Red Bull have had their issues off-track this year, too. Horner was under investigation for “inappropriate behaviour” towards a female colleague but was cleared after two independent investigations.

Design guru Adrian Newey will also leave the team for Aston Martin next year, while sporting director Jonathan Wheatley is leaving at the end of the season to become the team principal at Audi.

"I think we just paid the price with the change that we made into qualifying," Verstappen said post-race in Baku. "That made it just really difficult to drive.

"The car was jumping around a lot. The wheels were coming off the ground in the low-speed corners, so when you don’t have a contact patch with the tarmac, it’s very difficult.

"You win and lose as a team. We thought it would be a good direction to go into and at the end, it wasn’t."

Red Bull and Verstappen will be looking to bounce back this weekend under the lights at the Singapore Grand Prix.