The importance of Marko
At the end of last season, Helmut Marko’s activity at Red Bull (and more generally in F1) officially concluded after a long stay in the Anglo-Austrian team, where he served as a consultant in addition to having created and managed the historic Red Bull Junior Team talent pool. A ‘school’ that has seen many young talents grow up and then find a place in F1, just like those who currently occupy the seat of the Milton Keynes car, namely four-time world champion Max Verstappen and Isack Hadjar.
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Never disappeared from the team
Currently, the 82-year-old is enjoying a well-deserved retirement, but contacts with Red Bull have not disappeared at all; on the contrary. Confirmation came directly from the team’s most representative men, starting with Team Principal Laurent Mekies, who was promoted in 2025 from Racing Bulls after the dismissal of Christian Horner: “Helmut has remained very open and available to us – he told Beyond the Grid – I talk to him, they (the drivers) do, and I am sure we all talk to him and receive his advice, even if he is not seen on the track. You can’t turn the page on Helmut, who built this young driver program for two decades with incredible success. You don’t turn the page quickly. So, right now, we live off his legacy and, as I said, he is behind the scenes if we need him“.
Contacts remain
Marko absent from the pits but still present and available. A concept also shared by Max Verstappen, a driver who represented the top of the Red Bull Junior Team program and one of the team’s most brilliant chapters along with Sebastian Vettel’s repeated successes: “Maybe there will be a few fewer Austrian jokes from Helmut, but I am still in contact with him – he confirmed to the media – maybe not so much for the details of the car, but for life in general. I shared many moments with him, so, obviously, it will be a bit different in the garage, but you also have to look forward, right? You have to think about performance, but at the same time, as I said, we have a great relationship and we still stay in touch”.
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Gratitude
Further confirmation also came from Hadjar, who has always remained grateful to his mentor despite a start to his F1 career heavily criticized by Marko himself in early 2025 for crying after a mistake made on the formation lap in Australia: “There are certain things he wants to see, and I can’t speak for others and their experience, but I have always had a great relationship with him and he has contributed enormously to my career. The fact that he believed in me when others didn’t, I am very grateful to him, because without him this opportunity would not have come”.
