McLaren boss says Formula One is a ‘healthier’ place without Christian Horner

McLaren boss Zak Brown has claimed Formula One is a “healthier” place without Christian Horner after accusing the former Red Bull team principal of “crossing the line”.

Horner was released from his position on July 9. The last 18 months of his reign were overshadowed by an accusation from a female colleague of “coercive behaviour”. Horner always denied the claim and was twice exonerated.

The 51-year-old has been replaced by Laurent Mekies and Brown revealed he had met with the Frenchman ahead of Sunday’s Hungarian Grand Prix.

“I’m happy Laurent’s in the role he is in,” said Brown. “I like Laurent, that’ll be healthy, and maybe we can get back to focusing on competition on the track.

“There’s always going to be some political aspects to the sport, but I think it is going to be healthier with Laurent. I’m a fan of Laurent, I have known him for a long time, and it’ll be good to go racing against him.”

Brown and Horner did not get along and aimed a number of slights at each other over the years – both on and off the track.

Brown continued: “It went too far. There’s always going to be politicking in F1; let’s try and shut down their flexi-wings and that stuff, but when you start getting into frivolous allegations, that’s just going too far.

“If I look up and down pit lane now, I see us fighting each other hard politically, but the line is not being crossed, and that line got crossed before.

“So I think that we’ll see a little bit of a change for the better. There’s a higher level of trust that now if we sit down and have a conversation on a topic where we think there could be some confidentiality, and it’s just not an automatic: ‘I’m going to use that as a political weapon’.

“We’re going to be in a better place, a little bit more unified, and a little bit more trusting that while we’re fighting on track, we can have a conversation about what’s good for the sport off it. And that won’t get manipulated for political reasons and taken out of context.”

Horner led Red Bull to 14 world championships in two decades in charge and Brown, whose McLaren team lead both the drivers’ and constructors’ championships as the sport approaches its summer break, concluded: “I presume he’ll be back. He’s young, he’s a racer, and he’s got pretty awesome credentials.

“But I’m looking forward to racing Red Bull, more like we race Ferrari and Mercedes and being more collegiate, because it’s important for the benefit of the sport that we all can work together.”