Juan Pablo Montoya has never been one to tiptoe around the uncomfortable question in front of him, and he’s done it again with Red Bull’s handling of GianPiero Lambiase.
In Montoya’s view, this didn’t need to happen. Not because McLaren shouldn’t be allowed to go shopping for top talent — it should — but because Red Bull had the means to stop it. Lambiase, the engineer who’s been Verstappen’s constant presence on the radio since his first Red Bull win in 2016, is heading to Woking to become McLaren’s Chief Racing Officer. The role exists already within McLaren’s structure, but until now those responsibilities have effectively sat on Andrea Stella’s desk alongside the team principal job.
What makes the move so pointed is the timing and the subtext. Lambiase and Verstappen have both previously framed their partnership in almost contractual terms — not on paper, but in intent. Lambiase said back in 2023 that the day he and Verstappen stopped working together in their current set-up would be the day he’d be keen for a new challenge. Verstappen was even blunter: he’s told Lambiase he “only” works with him, and that if Lambiase stops, he stops too.
Now Lambiase is stopping — at least in his Red Bull role.
McLaren’s announcement makes clear it’s not an immediate switch. Lambiase will arrive “no later” than 2028, when his current Red Bull contract is due to expire. But the optics are unavoidable: one of Verstappen’s most trusted allies inside Red Bull has a new future mapped out elsewhere, and it’s been done in a way that inevitably stirs the Verstappen conversation Red Bull would rather keep quiet.
Montoya’s basic point is that Red Bull didn’t have to let a rival define Lambiase’s next step.
“It is interesting because he will now have a more important role than he had or could have had at Red Bull,” Montoya said, questioning why Red Bull didn’t simply create — or offer — a comparable job to keep him in Milton Keynes. From Montoya’s perspective, this is exactly the kind of retention play elite teams make when they know a person is strategically important beyond their job title.
And Lambiase is precisely that. Engineers don’t usually become symbols, but the Verstappen-Lambiase dynamic has been part of Red Bull’s identity through four world championships. It’s not just the calm voice on the pit wall; it’s the familiarity, the shorthand, the trust under pressure — the sense that Verstappen always has someone he believes in on the other end of the line.
When that certainty is removed, you don’t just lose an engineer. You introduce doubt.
Red Bull, of course, will argue that no individual is bigger than the team, and that processes and depth are what win in modern F1. That’s true — up to a point. But this is not a standard personnel change. This is a rival team signalling it can attract someone from the inner circle of the Verstappen era, and it’s doing it with a senior title that naturally invites the question: why wasn’t that pathway available at Red Bull?
McLaren, for its part, has pitched the hire as part of a wider strengthening of its talent pool and a statement of long-term ambition: not just to compete, but to stay in the mix as a championship-winning operation. Stella remains the key figure, but in practical terms it’s also a release valve — someone to take ownership of race operations at the highest level rather than loading everything onto the team principal.
What complicates things further is Verstappen’s own public mood. He’s been questioning his place in Formula 1, unhappy with what he’s labelled “anti-racing” regulations. That matters because Red Bull’s leverage over a generational driver isn’t only contractual. It’s emotional, competitive, cultural. If Verstappen is already looking at the sport through narrowed eyes — weighing whether it still gives him what he wants — then Red Bull can’t afford to let pillars of his environment drift away without consequence.
This is where Montoya pushes the conversation into the uncomfortable territory Red Bull knows too well: Mercedes.
Montoya suggested this could become the opening Verstappen needs if Red Bull’s competitive position slips, pointing to Toto Wolff’s longstanding interest in signing him. “This could well be the perfect opportunity for Verstappen,” Montoya said, adding that if Red Bull remains on the slower side, Verstappen will be “looking for a way out” as soon as possible.
There are a few layers to that. One is pure performance: if the car isn’t there, the driver’s patience gets tested. Another is structure: if the faces Verstappen relies on begin to change, the team starts to feel less like *his* Red Bull and more like just another employer. And then there’s the larger question of motivation in 2026’s landscape — whether Verstappen wants to grind through seasons that don’t align with his sense of what racing should be.
None of this means Verstappen is definitely leaving. It doesn’t even mean Lambiase’s eventual McLaren start date is the trigger point. But it does mean Red Bull has handed the paddock something it loves: a credible narrative thread, supported by years of quotes from both men, and now backed by a real contract and a real destination.
McLaren will be delighted with the ripple effect. Red Bull will insist it’s business as usual. Verstappen, as ever, will set his own terms.
But Montoya’s argument lands because it feels like the sort of own goal top teams try to avoid: when you’ve got the sport’s most valuable driver and one of his key confidants, you don’t let someone else offer the bigger title and the clearer future. You remove the temptation — and you keep your house quiet.
