Red Bull’s post-Lambiase plan is starting to take shape, and it has less to do with romance about “driver–engineer chemistry” than it does cold continuity in a garage bracing for churn.
Tom Hart is expected to step up as Max Verstappen’s race engineer for 2027, taking over from Gianpiero Lambiase when Lambiase’s long goodbye finally turns into a departure. Lambiase, who has been on Verstappen’s radio since May 2016 and now operates as Red Bull’s head of racing, was announced by McLaren in April as a future chief racing officer — a move McLaren said will happen “no later” than 2028. Red Bull, understandably, has been working on what the Verstappen side of the garage looks like once that voice is gone.
Hart’s promotion has been bubbling away behind the scenes for a while, but the timing matters. He had been lined up to join Williams as Alex Albon’s new race engineer before a deal was reached for him to stay put at Red Bull, with Laurent Mekies and James Vowles understood to have found common ground that kept the move from happening. Red Bull did not comment when asked.
From Red Bull’s perspective, this is the sort of staff decision that quietly tells you the team’s priority list. They can’t stop a figure as central and as publicly visible as Lambiase from taking a heavyweight offer elsewhere — but they can make sure the replacement isn’t a scramble, and they can make sure rivals don’t strengthen themselves on Red Bull’s own operational talent.
There’s also a reason Red Bull is said to be considering giving Hart a handful of stand-in weekends this year if practical, to smooth the handover for 2027. A race engineer swap isn’t just a name on an intercom; it’s the rhythm of decision-making, the shorthand over set-up direction, the way a driver is managed when the session goes sideways. Hart has already been building relevant experience: he’s been running race engineer duties in test environments with reserve driver Yuki Tsunoda in recent weeks, and he’s deputised for Lambiase before — notably in practice at Imola in 2024.
This all sits neatly alongside Mekies’ message from the Austrian Grand Prix that not every rumour about Red Bull personnel should be treated as an omen. He acknowledged that staff movement is being discussed loudly, and that some people had “changed their mind and are staying with us”. It was the sort of line that reads like a throwaway in a media pen, but it’s also a clear signal that Red Bull knows exactly how the paddock is reading the Lambiase news — as a possible breach point, not a one-off.
Hart’s own path makes the decision more interesting. He joined Red Bull in 2012 after previously working as a political researcher, and rose through the engineering ladder to become a performance engineer ahead of the 2020 season. That background typically produces an engineer who is strong on the “why” behind the numbers — the kind of person a team can trust to translate a messy Sunday into something actionable before the next event, and to do it without drama.
But there is a twist Red Bull can’t fully control, and it’s the one that makes all of this feel slightly provisional: Verstappen’s future.
Even as Red Bull sets up Hart to be “the next one”, it remains unclear whether Verstappen will be there to hear him. The four-time world champion is understood to be in talks with McLaren over a potential move. Officially, Verstappen is contracted to Red Bull until the end of 2028, yet it’s understood an exit clause could come into play if he is lower than second in the drivers’ standings at the summer break.
Right now, he’s nowhere near that threshold. Verstappen sits seventh with one race left before the August shutdown, 68 points behind Lewis Hamilton in second. In other words, the contractual politics that have hovered in the background for months are no longer theoretical. They’re staring at Red Bull from the timing screens.
That’s what makes Hart staying such an important win for Red Bull’s short-term stability. If Verstappen stays, the team gets a planned, managed transition away from one of the most established driver–engineer partnerships of the modern era. If Verstappen goes, Red Bull still keeps a proven senior engineer rather than donating him to Williams at the exact moment it might need experience and calm more than ever.
Either way, the message is the same: Red Bull is trying to reduce variables. Because when your most high-profile engineer is already booked for a rival, and your biggest competitive asset is flirting with an exit clause, you don’t leave the next moves to chance.
