Gianpiero Lambiase: What does Red Bull engineer's McLaren move mean for Max Verstappen and the two F1 teams?
Assessing the implications of Gianpiero Lambiase's switch from Red Bull to McLaren for the 2028 season; Max Verstappen's Red Bull future was already the centre of uncertainty even before details of Lambiase's switch emerged
Thursday 9 April 2026 19:11, UK
Formula 1 may not be staging any races in April but the news that Gianpiero Lambiase, Max Verstappen's race engineer, has agreed to join McLaren has provided one of the biggest stories in the sport so far in 2026.
So what do we know about the move and the knock-on effects for the two teams involved - including, crucially, for Red Bull's four-time world champion driver?
What is going on with Lambiase's future?
Red Bull's Lambiase, Verstappen's race engineer since 2016 and the team's head of racing, is joining McLaren in 2028.
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Although speculation that Lambiase's long-term future likely lay away from Red Bull anyway had swirled since the end of last year, with Aston Martin understood to have made a big-money move to make him their team principal, the emergence of the McLaren news on Thursday still came as a surprise.
Lambiase will become McLaren's chief racing officer, duties which are currently covered off by team principal Andrea Stella. Once Lambiase arrivals, Stella will have more time to devote to other aspects of his wide-ranging leadership role at the Woking team.
Lambiase's Red Bull contract runs to 2028, and while no specific date for the 45-year-old to make the switch has yet been announced, McLaren have said they expect to welcome him to the team "no later" than two seasons' time.
What does it mean for Max Verstappen's future?
Given Verstappen has previously stated in an interview that he would stop racing in Formula 1 when Lambiase leaves, the news could be seen as the clearest indication yet that the Dutchman will walk away from the sport within the next few years.
Verstappen has a Red Bull contract until the end of 2028 but Sky Sports News understands there are performance clauses which would allow him to depart earlier. Given Red Bull's struggles so far this season, Verstappen would likely be in a position to make an exit, if he wants to.
Some may see Lambiase's surprise switch to McLaren as Verstappen effectively giving his race engineer the nod that he will leave F1, so Lambiase should think about his own career - and the 45-year-old has chosen McLaren.
Verstappen has been vocal about his dissatisfaction with the new 2026 regulations. Although tweaks could be made as early as from the next F1 race in Miami, is it enough for Verstappen to stay?
The four-time world champion is already competing in GT3 racing and will participate in the Nurburgring 24 Hours in May - perhaps the first of several big motorsport adventures he targets.
As for his F1 career, without doubt Verstappen will have plenty to answer regarding his future on media day ahead of the Miami Grand Prix and whether he will stick to his words about not racing on without Lambiase in his ear.
What does it mean for McLaren?
McLaren have signed one of F1's top modern engineers to add to their already strong organisation, which actually contains two other former Red Bull members in Rob Marshall and Will Courtenay.
Marshall left Red Bull for McLaren in 2024 and has played a pivotal role in helping the team to two successive constructors' titles and Lando Norris becoming world champion in 2025.
Courtenay is McLaren's sporting director, where Lambiase will be able to provide extra support regarding race operations, taking some of that responsibility away from team principal Stella, who will be able to focus on wider aspects of the leadership.
Despite some initial reports suggesting that Lambiase was being hired as a successor to Stella, Sky Sports News understands that the Italian is not going anywhere and has a long-term contact with McLaren, making any rumours of him returning to Ferrari untrue. In fact, Stella was part of the discussions to sign Lambiase and remains happy at McLaren.
McLaren is becoming a super team in its structure and Lambiase has clearly been impressed by the championship-winning culture created by chief executive Zak Brown and Stella.
What does it mean for Red Bull?
For Red Bull, the impending departure of a well-regarded figure in Lambiase represents another significant exit among the team's senior leadership.
While managing personnel change is inevitable for F1 teams, particularly after a long period of success and stability as Ferrari found in the mid-2000s and, to a degree, Mercedes, in recent years, the number of senior public-facing staff who have left Red Bull over the past two years has still been particularly stark.
Since the end of 2023, the team's most-recent constructors' title-winning season in which they won all but one of the 22 races, Red Bull have seen chief engineering officer Marshall and head of race strategy Courtenay both join McLaren, chief technical officer and legendary designer Adrian Newey join Aston Martin, and sporting director Jonathan Wheatley also exit for a stint at Audi.
Team principal Christian Horner and long-time Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko also made sudden exits from their respective roles last year.
Lambiase's role at Red Bull encompasses more than race engineering Verstappen on a race weekend - he was made head of race engineering in 2022 and then head of racing at the end of 2024 - so Red Bull will now have to work out who will eventually take on those key duties into the longer term.
For now, Red Bull have confirmed Lambiase will continue in that dual role until he leaves in 2028.
Given the brain drain of the past two years from senior roles, will Red Bull - who famously made some big signings such as Newey in the years before they first became a front-running F1 force - feel they have to go on the offensive to try and poach some key figures from rivals or will they continue to trust in promoting promising in-house talent?
Given star driver Verstappen's future was already in growing doubt even before news of Lambiase's move emerged, team boss Laurent Mekies and Red Bull managing director Oliver Mintzlaff will surely be keen to buck the recent trend of losing key talent to rivals as they bid to mould a new-look team for future success in the post-Horner era.
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