The shock departure of Christian Horner as Red Bull Racing CEO and Formula 1 team principal has been accompanied by the exit of two other senior figures.
Group chief marketing and commercial officer Oliver Hughes and group director of communications Paul Smith (pictured above, with Horner) are understood to have been relieved of their duties.
Hughes (pictured below) had been at Red Bull since 2017 while Smith joined in 2022. Having been promoted to even more senior positions on the marketing and communications sides respectively, they worked very closely with Horner, who was "released from his operational duties" on Wednesday.
Horner was informed by Red Bull of its decision on Tuesday evening then told the team at its Milton Keynes headquarters himself on Wednesday morning.
Removing two senior figures who had been put at the top of their respective groups by Horner suggests Red Bull's parent company in Austria wants to unpick the way Horner centralised operations at Milton Keynes and install its own leadership in those respective departments.
That would supports a long-standing effort by Red Bull GmbH to exert more control over the management of its F1 operations - which comprises Red Bull Racing, Red Bull Technology and Red Bull Powertrains - since the death of co-founder Dietrich Mateschitz, who had empowered Horner to establish a sprawling empire at Milton Keynes and take day-to-day responsibility of it.
Horner led Red Bull Racing for 20 years, from its inception following the energy drinks company's takeover of Jaguar.
Some very influential and high-profile members of the team have left in recent years, in part due to personal and/or professional controversies Horner has been part of, including former technical chief Adrian Newey, sporting director Jonathan Wheatley, chief engineering officer Rob Marshall and soon-to-leave strategy boss Will Courtenay, who will reunite with Marshall at McLaren next year.
However, there are many who have worked with Horner from the beginning or, as with the two whose exits have come on Wednesday, been recruited on his watch. So his departure was always likely to prompt close allies to consider their own positions.
Others to have benefitted from Horner's support include technical director Pierre Wache, and the revised trackside leadership team that Horner put in place after Wheatley left.
Max Verstappen's race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase was promoted from head of race engineering to head of racing, giving him overall responsibility for the race, heritage and car build teams, as well as the strategy group.
Reporting into him is Steve Knowles, acting head of sporting, who focuses on regulatory matters, and Rich Wolverson, who was named head of race team operations managing the day-to-day operations of the race and heritage teams.
It is unclear if any other senior figures will leave alongside Horner, or in the wake of his exit - or if there will be any changes to the team in the coming weeks under new Red Bull Racing CEO Laurent Mekies.
