Exclusive: Christian Horner takes aim at ‘short-termist’ nature of rival F1 team principals

Christian Horner has said this generation of F1 team managers are more “short-termist” than their predecessors, focusing only on “their little area” rather than the sport as a whole.

Having been in Formula 1 for 18 years, Horner has shared the paddock with a number of different team principals and the many personalities that they bring.

Starting at a time when the likes of Bernie Ecclestone, Max Mosley, Jean Todt, Ron Dennis and Flavio Briatore were big names in the sport, Horner has seen F1 go through quite the evolution.

Christian Horner suggest current crop of F1 bosses unlike the old

Horner is the sole team principal left standing from Red Bull’s debut year in 2005 with the role of a boss dramatically different than it was in those days.

Having had a foot in both camps, Horner remarked that the modern generation of F1 bosses are “very short-termist” and focused solely on “their little area.”

“I had the privilege of seeing up close how some legendary leaders were operating when I first came into the sport,” he exclusively told PlanetF1.com. “Bernie Ecclestone and Max Mosley were running the business very tightly.

“But then there was Ron Dennis, there was Jean Todt, there was Flavio Briatore. Big personalities, big characters.

“I suppose the difference between now and then is that they were all quite entrepreneurial, and they thought of the bigger picture whereas now you see a bunch of managers in the room that are very short termist, who only focus on their little area. So that’s been an interesting change.”

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Since he arrived in the sport, Horner has gone on to become one of the most successful team principals in Formula 1 history but insisted he did not style himself on any of his predecessors, choosing to instead use the skills he learned as owner of the Formula 3000 team Arden.

“There’s nobody that I modelled myself on,” the 49-year-old said. “I had a lot of admiration for them whether it was Ron or Frank or what Jean Todt did. Flavio in his flamboyant way.

“They’re all very different but the one commonality that they had was that they would do the best that they could for their team and assemble the right group of people together.”

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