Red Bull promises legal battle

THE first call Red Bull boss Christian Horner made when he stepped off the plane from Melbourne was to his lawyer.

Daniel Ricciardo with Christian Horner, the Red Bull team principal boss. Picture: Wayne

THE first call Christian Horner made when he stepped off the plane from Melbourne was to his lawyer.

The team principal who has built a dynasty in a decade at Red Bull is refusing to take the decision by stewards to disqualify Daniel Ricciardo from the Australian Grand Prix lying down. The result will be a legal battle on a grand scale as Horner attempts to restore his driver’s second placing.

The sympathy of a nation will be behind him. Australian fans who went to bed on Sunday night not having a clue that the local hero had been unceremoniously ejected from his home grand prix woke up to the lurid headline in Melbourne’s Herald Sun: “Grand Farce”.

Anger and frustration coursed through the nation as Australia attempted to grapple with the concept of a sport that can allow 100,000 spectators to leave the arena and then more than five hours later change the result. F1 is used to settling its disputes through the arguments of expensive lawyers, and governing body FIA said it would probably be anxious to arrive at a verdict before the Malaysian Grand Prix on Sunday week, perhaps expecting a run of disputes surrounding the complex regulations devised to control the new hybrid engines launched at Albert Park.

Horner had warned there would be problems with such “immature technology” and he was not alone in expecting legal issues as teams try to wring the best out of their complicated hybrid systems while staying within legal boundaries.

Horner has enjoyed winning four consecutive constructors’ world championships, while driver Sebastian Vettel has dominated, and has not yet run the treadmill of legal wrangling and internecine struggle like Ron Dennis, who returned to the pitwall with his McLaren team. Not that he was supposed to be there. Having ousted Martin Whitmarsh to take back control of the team he effectively created, Dennis insisted that he would not be seen interfering in strategy calls from the pitwall - only to turn up in the final minutes of the race as Kevin Magnussen, on his debut outing in F1, and Jenson Button homed in on third and fourth places respectively.

Their promotion to second and third after Ricciardo’s disqualification meant there were no celebrations. When asked how he would toast this momentous start to his F1 career, Magnussen, 21, shrugged and said: “Nothing.”

Dennis told his driver: “Keep your feet on the ground.

“A very wise old man went into his house and nailed to the ceiling was a pair of shoes. I asked what they were for and he said they were his son’s shoes because every time he sees them it reminds him to keep his feet on the ground. I will put some in your hotel room.”

So the race turned out to be one young man’s dream and another’s nightmare.

Ricciardo now needs his day in court to resurrect that dream.

THE TIMES