Christian Horner is ready to come out fighting against ‘cheating’ accusations ahead of US Grand Prix after Red Bull were found in ‘minor’ breach of Formula One’s £114m spending cap en route to Max Verstappen’s first title
- Christian Horner will come out to defend ‘cheating’ claims in Austin this week
- Red Bull were found to be in a minor breach of the £114million spending cap
- Lewis Hamilton was controversially beaten to the 2021 title by Max Verstappen
- Horner was only told of cap breach an hour after Verstappen won second title
Red Bull boss Christian Horner will defend himself against accusations they ‘cheated’ to help Max Verstappen win the world title last year in a press conference ahead of the US Grand Prix in Austin.
His team were found in breach of the £114million budget cap for 2021 and are still waiting to hear what sanction they will face more than a week after the news was broken to them.
Sportsmail can reveal that Horner was told of the breach only an hour after Verstappen retained his championship in Japan a week last Sunday.
The timing struck Red Bull as pointed and has added to their feeling of persecution.
Since then the dialogue between the FIA and the Milton Keynes-based team has been minimal.
Christian Horner (left) will address ‘cheating’ accusations ahead of the US Grand Prix in Austin
Red Bull were found to be in ‘minor’ breach of the £114m spending cap in 2021 en route to Max Verstappen (right) winning his maiden world drivers’ championship title
Red Bull, it is believed, want the details made public so they can prove, as they see it, they did not overspend for performance reasons – and instead insist that the overspend, believed to be some £1.8m, related to non-track areas: such as catering, sick pay, gardening leave, which combined may amount to half or more of the total breach amount.
Although Red Bull can say nothing while the process is ongoing, it is understood on good authority that they contend the interpretation of the use of unused parts was changed on June 16, three months after they submitted their audited accounts.
That came little more than a fortnight after Shaila-Ann Roe left Mercedes, where she is thought to have acted as a legal adviser to team principal Toto Wolff, to join the governing body as secretary general.
Lewis Hamilton was denied a record eighth world championship by Verstappen last season
Verstappen passed Hamilton on the final lap of the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix in the season finale to claim an extraordinary maiden world championship
The next public showdown for Horner comes on Saturday in Austin, where he is due to be grouped together in a press conference alongside Wolff and his other chief accuser, Ferrari’s Matteo Binotto.
He will at least not have to confront McLaren’s Zak Brown, who has written to the FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem to draw a line between Red Bull and the word ‘cheating. Its details were leaked on Monday.
Red Bull will have to decide whether to accept the accepted breach agreement (ABA) – thought likely to be both financial and sporting – or challenge the ruling.
Agreeing to the ABA would be an admission of guilt, but going down the legal route opens them up to their doomsday scenario of a heftier sanction that could endanger Verstappen’s triumph of 2021, thus handing an eighth crown to Lewis Hamilton, who was pipped on the final lap in Abu Dhabi in December.
The FIA declined to comment.
McLaren chief Zak Brown (right) has called for strict penalties to teams breaking F1’s budget cap while Mercedes boss Toto Wolff (left) wants to see a precedent set for punishment