Former Red Bull star Sebastien Buemi has revealed that he could have returned to Formula 1 with the company a few years ago but opted against it.

Buemi has carved out a hugely successful career in motorsport with multiple wins of the World Endurance Championship (WEC) and the Le Mans 24 Hours but wasn’t able to achieve such success during his stint in Formula 1.

Sebastien Buemi: My path was better than a return to Formula 1

Buemi was a leading light of Red Bull’s junior programme in the brand’s early years in Formula 1, and he landed a seat as Red Bull’s test and reserve driver for the 2008 season.

He achieved a race seat in 2009, arriving at the then-Toro Rosso team (now Racing Bulls) to become the first Swiss driver since Jean-Louis Deletraz to race in F1.

Buemi stayed with Toro Rosso for three seasons and fared well against teammates Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Bourdais.

But Buemi never achieved a huge result, with his best finishes being two seventh-place results in his debut championship year.

Huge success awaited Buemi once he’d stepped away from Formula 1, however, after Red Bull dropped him from their line-up in 2012. Over the next decade, Buemi became a leading light in the WEC to win four titles as part of Toyota’s lineup, as well as multiple second and third-place finishes.

Also being part of the winning line-up at the Le Mans 24 Hours on four occasions, he also won the Formula E championship for Renault e.Dams in 2015/16. Buemi remains part of Toyota’s line-up in WEC, with his most recent championship win being in 2023, as well as driving for Envision Racing in Formula E.

His comparative lack of success in Formula 1 could be attributed to uncompetitive machinery, combined with relative inexperience at the time he got the call-up from Red Bull, but the prospect of a comeback was dangled in front of him a few years later.

Red Bull kept Buemi around for a long time, where he served as a reserve driver – even appearing at the Young Drivers’ Test at Yas Marina in 2020.

Speaking to e-Formel.de, Buemi said he had conversations about a comeback in the late 2010s, with Toro Rosso switching their driver line-ups frequently as Red Bull attempted to find space for all their drivers following Max Verstappen’s rapid rise to the senior team – the team even called up another former junior driver Brendon Hartley, who had impressed alongside Buemi in sportscars.

“We had a conversation with Christian Horner and Dr. [Helmut] Marko in 2018,” Buemi said.

“But that didn’t really make sense for me because I had good contracts in Formula E and with Toyota.

“I would have had the chance to drive for Toro Rosso again. But for me, it was better to continue on my path than to return to Formula 1.”

With Marko explaining several years ago that Buemi couldn’t be offered the same salary at Toro Rosso as he had been earning in Formula E and WEC, the Austrian’s stance had changed from the admission of being unimpressed by Buemi at the end of 2011 when he said “We did not see any further potential for growth. We need winners.”

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While things never worked out for Buemi with Red Bull, the Swiss driver said he didn’t bear any bad blood towards the organisation with whom he remained associated for a long time after his tenure as an F1 driver ended.

“I think Red Bull and Dr. Marko have done a lot for me,” he said.

“I am very grateful for that. Of course, I did not really understand the decision at the time – I would have loved to drive the Red Bull car. But it was not my decision and I had to deal with it.

“That was very difficult at the time. You have done everything your whole life to drive in Formula 1. These decisions are not easy to understand, but I stayed with Red Bull as a reserve driver at the time. You just have to accept that and immediately think about your future again.

“I immediately focussed on Toyota in WEC again. It was not so easy at the beginning, but I knew that the speed was there.

“You also have to have a bit of luck in motorsport. And I’ve been very lucky in WEC and Formula E. I won both championships, but you also have to be a bit lucky to be in the right team at the right time. And in Formula 1, it wasn’t the right time (for me).”

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