It started on a Friday in Miami. Laurent Mekies, speaking to Sky Sports, offered what seemed like a generous assessment of Gianpiero Lambiase’s future at McLaren: “GP had an extraordinary opportunity. You know, he’s going to be a team principal there.” By Sunday morning, Zak Brown was walking into the Red Bull hospitality suite for a face-to-face meeting. In between, the paddock had a field day — and Andrea Stella reached for a culinary metaphor sharp enough to cut through pastry.

How It Unfolded

Friday — Mekies to Sky Sports

Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies suggests Lambiase will become team principal at McLaren: “Now GP had an extraordinary opportunity. You know, he’s going to be a team principal there.”

Friday — Brown’s response

When Mekies’s words are put to Zak Brown, the McLaren CEO responds with a laugh: “He knows something I don’t, apparently. I’ve got one, and I’ve got a great one. I’ve got the best one in pitlane — Andrea Stella. So I couldn’t be happier with Andrea.” Brown also hints the situation could become “uncomfortable” for Lambiase if he remains at Red Bull for two more years knowing his future lies at a rival team, drawing a parallel to Lewis Hamilton’s final months at Mercedes before his Ferrari move.

Sunday morning — Direct talks

Brown visits the Red Bull hospitality suite and meets with Mekies and Red Bull GmbH managing director Oliver Mintzlaff. The meeting lasts long enough to be noticed. Mekies’s post-race explanation, initially: “It was about Red Bull — he just wanted to taste the Red Bull!”

Sunday post-race — Resolution

Mekies, more seriously: “We talk very often with Zak and with my other colleagues. None of us wanted to go into a ping-pong about it. We had a good chat about it, like we always do, and we move on.”

What Lambiase Is Actually Going to Do

The official record is clear. McLaren’s announcement, aligned with Red Bull’s own communication, stated that Lambiase — universally known in the paddock as “GP” — would join the Woking team as Chief Racing Officer, reporting to team principal Andrea Stella. The role of team principal at McLaren is not vacant, and there are no announced plans for it to be. When Mekies suggested Lambiase would effectively occupy that position, he was, at minimum, speaking loosely. McLaren was quick to correct the record.

📋 Lambiase — What Is Confirmed
  • Current role: Head of Racing and race engineer to Max Verstappen at Red Bull
  • Confirmed future role: Chief Racing Officer at McLaren, reporting to Andrea Stella
  • Timeline: Joins McLaren no later than 2028 — Red Bull expects him to serve out his contract
  • Brown: “2028 is when his contract is through — we’ll wait if that’s what’s necessary”
  • Brown also left the door open to an earlier departure if the relationship becomes untenable

Brown’s Hamilton comparison was pointed. When Hamilton announced his Ferrari move, Mercedes gradually reduced the information he had access to as the departure date approached — a natural consequence of knowing sensitive technical knowledge might eventually benefit a rival. Brown suggested the same dynamics could apply to Lambiase: “At some point, it will probably be uncomfortable having someone who you know is going to a rival team. If someone doesn’t want to be in my team anymore — I’ve never been one who feels like people steal from each other. You lose them or they have interest in something else.”

Stella’s Culinary Revenge

Andrea Stella, the man at the centre of the rumours — some reports had speculated he was bound for Ferrari, freeing the McLaren team principal role for Lambiase — was characteristically composed. And cutting.

“Honestly, some of the recent rumours, including those regarding astronomical salaries and mythical pre-contracts, have made me smile. It almost seems as though the ‘silly season’, which usually begins before summer, has arrived early. It almost looks like that some envious pastry chef has tried to spoil the preparation of a good dessert at the McLaren patisserie. However, we do know very well how to distinguish the good ingredients from the poisoned biscuits.”

— Andrea Stella, McLaren Team Principal

Ferrari had already dismissed any suggestion that Stella was heading to Maranello. The Italian’s own statement effectively ended the conversation — with more style than a simple denial would have permitted.

Red Bull’s Deeper Problem: A Talent Exodus

Beneath the comic diplomacy of the Lambiase episode lies a genuinely serious structural challenge for Red Bull. Lambiase is not the first — and probably will not be the last — prominent figure to leave Milton Keynes for a rival team.

🚪 Recent Red Bull Departures — Key Names
Adrian Newey → Aston Martin (joined 2025 as Managing Technical Partner)
Christian Horner → Departed 2025 following internal investigation
Helmut Marko → Retired / stepped back from active role
Jonathan Wheatley → Audi (departed before 2026 season)
Rob Marshall → McLaren (as Chief Designer)
Will Courtenay → McLaren (as Head of Strategy)
Gianpiero Lambiase → McLaren (Chief Racing Officer, no later than 2028)

Mekies did not attempt to minimise the scale of these departures. He acknowledged them openly — and framed Red Bull’s response as a talent development and retention strategy that is already underway. Ben Waterhouse has been promoted to Head of Performance Engineering, reporting to technical director Pierre Waché. Andrea Landi, previously at Ferrari and Racing Bulls, joins on 1 July as Head of Performance.

“We don’t want to be defensive about the fact that we lost some talent. It’s a fact. And it’s been there for three or four years. As a result of that, it’s the highest priority in the team to make sure that we create the environment in order to retain, develop and attract the best talent in the pitlane. If and when we need to go and get a specific set of skills or experience from some of our dear competitors around the pitlane, we will do it — as we have done before.”

— Laurent Mekies, Red Bull Team Principal

On the specific question of replacing Lambiase as race engineer for Verstappen — or whoever sits in the RB22 next season — Mekies was relaxed, at least publicly: “In terms of replacing GP, we have a couple of years to think about it.” A joke, but not entirely. Red Bull has time. The question is whether the team can use it to rebuild the institutional depth that five years of high-profile exits have gradually eroded.