David Coulthard reckons Red Bull has found its groove again, insisting Laurent Mekies and Max Verstappen have built a relationship strong enough to paper over a period that saw half the senior management walk out the door. Nice theory. The standings, mind you, tell a slightly different story.
Verstappen sits sixth in the championship on 112 points, some 130 behind runaway leader Kimi Antonelli, and Red Bull are fourth in the constructors’ standings on 186 points, comfortably behind Mercedes, Ferrari and McLaren. That is the context in which Coulthard’s praise for the atmosphere inside Milton Keynes needs to be read. Good chemistry is nice. Trophies are better.
Coulthard’s Verdict
Coulthard, who drove for the team between 2005 and 2008 and remains a Red Bull ambassador, was in expansive mood when discussing the working relationship between his old employer’s team principal and its lead driver. Speaking exclusively to RacingNews365, he described the pairing in glowing terms.
“Laurent’s job is to make sure that they have the right people growing within, and the right people coming in. Max is someone who brings people, so it’s like an Adrian Newey; if Adrian is there, people think: ‘Oh, he must know’, and you can see that it hasn’t worked out, but in the longer term, I’m sure they’ll come forward.” – David Coulthard
That is a fairly generous reading of a team that has shed a small army of senior figures since 2024: Christian Horner as team principal, Adrian Newey as chief technical officer, Jonathan Wheatley as sporting director, Will Courtenay as head of strategy, Craig Skinner as chief designer, and Helmut Marko as driver advisor. Gianpiero Lambiase, Verstappen’s long-time race engineer and head of race engineering, is also on his way out to join McLaren. That is not a rebuild. That is closer to a demolition with a fresh coat of paint promised for later.
Why Mekies, of All People
Mekies arrived at Red Bull GmbH last July following Horner’s sacking, parachuted in from sister outfit Racing Bulls. Before that he spent time at the FIA as safety director and deputy race director, and had a stint at Ferrari as sporting and racing director. Coulthard’s argument is that Mekies’ insider status made the transition smoother than it might otherwise have been.
“It takes time to build, but I think the key thing is that Laurent was part of the Red Bull family, so he hasn’t had to build that relationship with Austria and the owners because they know him already. He brings a wealth of experience from the FIA, from Ferrari, from his career, and he’s a different personality and has a different way of operating than Christian Horner, but there’s more than one person who wins a world championship as a team principal.” – David Coulthard
That last line is doing a lot of work. Horner won multiple championships with Red Bull. Mekies has, so far, won none. Whether he eventually joins that list is a question for the coming seasons, not this one, and pointing out that titles have been won by different types of leader is true but says nothing about whether this particular leader will end up on that list.
The Numbers Under Mekies
To be fair to the Frenchman, his tenure has not been a disaster on track. Verstappen mounted a late surge in the 2025 title fight under Mekies’ stewardship, ultimately missing out by just two points, which is about as close as a driver can get to a championship without actually winning it. Mekies also oversaw the final stages of the Red Bull Powertrains project, the in-house engine that made its debut in 2026, a genuinely enormous engineering undertaking that could define the team’s next decade regardless of who is sitting in the team principal’s chair.
He has also signed Verstappen to a new contract running until 2030, finally putting a lid on the seemingly endless speculation about the four-time champion walking away. And he has pulled Gwen Lagrue across from Mercedes to run the junior programme, a hire that suggests Red Bull is still trying to plug gaps rather than simply patching over them.
Reading the Frustration Correctly
Coulthard’s most interesting comment was not really about chemistry at all. It was an acknowledgement that Verstappen’s public frustration this season, and there has been plenty of it, is not some personal failing but a symptom of a wider malaise.
“I think Laurent understands that; he’s very calm, and he understands that Max has the right to be frustrated, because he understands the team is frustrated. The chemistry is good, and I think that helps take away the doubt from the media, which then adds to the chemistry.” – David Coulthard
That is a more honest framing than most team ambassadors bother with. Verstappen’s irritation this year has not come from nowhere. A car that has, at points, struggled to match Mercedes and Ferrari for outright pace will do that to even the calmest of champions, and Red Bull’s current gap to the top of the constructors’ table is not the sort of thing calm chemistry alone fixes.
Chemistry Doesn’t Win Titles
None of this makes Coulthard wrong, exactly. Keeping Verstappen happy and contracted through 2030 while the team rebuilds around him is a genuine achievement given how close he reportedly came to walking. But good vibes in the garage are a lagging indicator, not a leading one. Red Bull’s actual job now is turning that calm into pace, because Antonelli, Norris and company are not going to wait around for the chemistry to translate into results. If it does not happen soon, Coulthard’s warm words will start to look like exactly the kind of media spin he claims Mekies has managed to avoid.
