Christian Horner's biography
Find out more about this year's guest speaker Christian Horner.
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The Lord Austin Lecture and Dinner: F1 - Performing Beyond the Circuit.
Christian Horner - Team Principal (Red Bull Racing)
Red Bull Racing’s Team Principal was born in Royal Leamington Spa, UK. At the age of 12, his parents took him to a kart track where his love of motor sport began.
David Coulthard was already a star name in karting when Horner began. “I seem to remember ads for karts that said, ‘you too can race the same kart as David Coulthard’”, recalls Horner. “My contemporaries were Fisichella, Trulli, Magnussen and Franchitti.” He finished third in the British Championship in 1990 before winning a Formula Renault scholarship for 1991. “I remember winning a race at Pembrey circuit in Wales, beating Pedro de la Rosa into second place. From there I moved up to Formula 3, convinced I was going to be a grand prix driver.”
A move to F3000 was next and Horner set up his own squad, but, with a bare-bones team, he realised just how hard it was to both drive and manage. “So I decided to stop driving and focus on the Arden team,” explains Horner, whose last race was at Nurburgring in 1998. Arden began to make its mark, with Bjorn Wirdheim taking the title in 2003 and in 2004 Tonio Liuzzi became champion with seven wins, while team-mate Robert Doornbos won at Spa. ”I had achieved everything I could in F3000,” concludes Horner. “It was time to move on and Formula One had always been my goal and so my discussions started with Red Bull”. The rest, as they say, is history.
Red Bull Racing scored an impressive 34 points in its first year in 2005, achieved its first ever podium in 2006 and ended this year’s FIA Constructors’ Championship in fifth place overall.