Red Bull senior advisor Helmut Marko has gone on record to state that Liam Lawson’s original promotion to Red Bull Racing was encouraged by former designer Adrian Newey…

…But Newey’s wife has one simple explanation for why her husband had nothing to do with the decision.

Amanda Newey challenges Helmut Marko claim

In the aftermath of Red Bull’s decision to demote Liam Lawson back to Racing Bulls in order to promote the more experienced Yuki Tsunoda to Red Bull proper, team advisor Helmut Marko has shared key insight into the decision making process.

One of the biggest questions surrounding the affair was why Lawson was promoted to Red Bull in the first place — and Marko had an answer for that.

“For a long time, Yuki had the image of not performing consistently and making silly mistakes here and there,” Marko told Kleine Zeitung.

“This happened last year in Mexico, for example, where the decision-making phase began for us. With Lawson, it was initially the exact opposite: he came and delivered immediately, no matter how much pressure there was. In hindsight, however, it wasn’t the right decision.

“In general, however, a lot can be attributed to a single incident. Tsunoda once drove into Pierre Gasly’s car there, and parts of the cars on the track subsequently damaged the underbody of Verstappen’s car, which caused him to lose the race.

“Adrian Newey was furious at the time. From then on, Yuki was a red rag to him. But now Newey is gone and Yuki has worked hard on himself.”

More on Liam Lawson and Red Bull Racing:

👉 The truth behind the different RB21s driven by Verstappen and Lawson

👉 11 F1 driver demotions just as brutal as Liam Lawson’s swap

Now, Amanda Newey — Adrian Newey’s wife — has spoken out about the allegation that her husband had anything to do with Red Bull Racing’s promotion decisions for 2025.

“That doesn’t make sense,” she wrote in response to the story. “He was on garden leave.” That statement was followed by an eye-roll emoji.

In early 2024, Adrian Newey announced that he would be departing the Red Bull Racing team “in the first quarter of 2024″ after joining the team all the way back in 2006. Though he attended some early races in the 2024 season, Newey largely stepped back from the Formula 1 operation to focus in the RB17 hypercar.

In September, the late Eddie Jordan confirmed that Newey had entered a period of gardening leave before making the swap to Aston Martin.

On the Formula For Success podcast, Jordan stated, “Adrian is not there [at Red Bull]. He’s on gardening leave. He has a date in his contract, which was stipulated by me and Red Bull, of the 6th of September. That was adhered to in every single way.”

With the Mexico City Grand Prix taking place over a month later, near the end of October, then Amanda Newey is correct: Her husband would have already stepped back from his work with Red Bull Racing and would therefore have had no sway over any 2025 signing decisions that took place in the aftermath of Mexico.

Newey is now back to work, this time with Aston Martin in a role he started on March 3, 2025.

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