Horner Clarifies 'Childish' Radio Message From Race Engineer To Verstappen

Tuesday, 23 July 2024 at 10:00

Christian Horner gave his understanding of the frosty exchange on the radio between Max Verstappen and his engineer Gianpiero Lambiase.

The 2024 Hungarian Grand Prix was a challenging race for the whole Red Bull Racing team, but especially for the strategy crew and Max Verstappen's part of the garage.

The triple World Champion was not happy with the strategy that he was given and was being overly aggressive on his team radio.

Gianpiero Lambiase (Verstappen's engineer) was, as usual, having none of it and, in return, wasn't nice to the Dutchman either. There were quite a few tense exchanges, and one of them came right after the 26-year-old's collision with Lewis Hamilton.

The Dutchman went for a dive down the inside from far away and locked up his wheels, which resulted in a collision. However, he claimed he wouldn't have locked up had it not been for Hamilton's move under braking. He shouted on the team radio, "He [Hamilton] moved under braking!"

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After saying that, Verstappen got a response that was generally understood as Lambiase calling him childish. The engineer said:

"I'm not even going to get into a radio fight with the other teams, Max. We'll let the stewards do their thing. It's childish on the radio. Childish."

Interestingly, the team principal of Red Bull Racing, Christian Horner, offered a different view on the radio exchange as he was talking to the media after the race. As reported by PlanetF1, he said:

"GP (Gianpiero Lambiase), I think at that point actually wasn't referring to Max; I think he's referring to others on the radio complaining about penalties."

"So, I don't think GP's reference at that point was in reference to Max. Others are obviously goading for penalties, because obviously, the stewards are listening to the radio as well."

Verstappen and his engineer are known to have this type of relationship where they often have a salty exchange on the radio. Helmut Marko previously referred to them as a "married couple." Horner added:

"They've been together for eight years, and there are things that we could have done better in the race today, but it's something that we'll talk about as a team."