F1 champion plays down Red Bull links after Christian Horner comments

Reigning F1 champion Lando Norris has played down recent comments from Christian Horner about using Red Bull's simulator early in his career.

Norris and George Russell were both named (with Oscar Piastri) by the former Red Bull boss as having paid to use his old team's sim rig back in the early 2010s, and noted Helmut Marko's disinterest in signing any of the trio when told that they'd performed well.

Norris hinted this week that any suggestion that the link meant that he was close to Red Bull was far of the mark, however, pointing out that as a young teenager, he was simply looking to get as much experience as possible.

Russell responded similarly when Horner's comments on the High Performance podcast were brought up, pointing out that the simulator tech was relatively rare at the time.

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Norris: Red Bull sim time 'way before McLaren'

"I remember George Russell was paying us to go on our simulator, as was Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. Their dads were writing cheques for them to run on the driver simulator that we had," Horner said, promoting his new book.

"And the guy that was looking after it was coming up to me and saying, 'Christian, these kids are better than the juniors we've got at the moment'. I remember taking them to Helmut and going, 'Look, I really think you should look at these guys'."

Norris responded to Horner's comments at the US Grand Prix this week, saying: “This is when I was like 13, this was way before McLaren. I couldn't be driving someone else's sim when I'm with McLaren. This was when I was like five years, four years before McLaren. I've not seen any of this or heard any of it.

“I was doing it with a lot of different teams. I was trying to get experience. I was learning from different people. At that age, it's more valuable than ever to do as much as you possibly can.

“I drove on different simulators from different teams because it was a good thing for me, especially at that age. I don't know what came out of it after that. So it was more just for my own learning than anything else.”

Russell: Sim work was just prep for Formula Renault

Russell was similarly hands-off when his sim time as a young driver was raised, pointing out that he didn't have much of a chance to do that sort of testing otherwise.

“Back in 2013, simulators weren't really a thing for anybody," he said. "Junior teams didn't have simulators. There was an opportunity to do some driving on that simulator in the Formula Renault car.

“So it was more as preparation for testing and driving for the series that we were racing. No teams had it, so that's the extent of it.”

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