McLaren’s chief designer, Rob Marshall, revealed the reasons that made him leave a well-established team like Red Bull during a period of dominance to embrace the exciting project of the Woking-based team. According to an interview with GPblog, McLaren’s fascinating history played a crucial role in his decision.
A choice that few would have made, given that the engineer was leaving Red Bull during a period of dominance for a McLaren in deep crisis, going through a phase of profound changes, starting with the promotion of Andrea Stella as team principal.
“For me, it’s an honor to be called to work somewhere, but when you look at the grid, there are only a few teams with a true, lasting, and proven tradition and history. Ferrari has plenty of it, as does McLaren and Williams,” Marshall begins, celebrating the history of these three teams that have made Formula 1 history.
“But McLaren’s name, the drivers who have raced here: a lot of people are fans of McLaren. If you ask why they are fans of McLaren, they answer something like, ‘Well, for Senna and Prost’ or for Hakkinen, not necessarily just for Lando and Oscar.”
The British engineer then compared it to Red Bull, which, given its recent history, has fans who have only approached the Milton Keynes-based team in recent years, thanks to drivers like Sebastian Vettel or Max Verstappen.
How Andrea Stella and Zak Brown convinced Rob Marshall
Zak Brown’s total revolution seems to have convinced the chief designer. As he explained in a recent interview, McLaren’s CEO’s goal was to change the mentality of the team and its image in the eyes of all the fans.
Ironically, the American had described this journey by comparing it to a famous movie: “If we compare it to Star Wars, McLaren has played the role of Darth Vader for a long time. Black, cold, and terrifying. Now we are trying to look a bit like Luke Skywalker, full of energy, colorful, and young.”
Rob Marshall was impressed by this change and praised the two figures responsible for McLaren’s revival: “From the outside, for many years, McLaren was considered a gray place where gray people went to work. There was a sort of underlying misery everywhere.”
“Andrea Stella is an inspiring leader, but he really cares about everyone. Zak makes me laugh every time I talk to him. He’s so charismatic and enthusiastic. He’s a great leader, both of them are,” the chief designer states. This collaboration has borne fruit in the last season. The MCL38 was the best car in the field. McLaren’s Team Principal himself was satisfied with the decision to hire Marshall, who arrived at Woking with a wealth of experience and technical knowledge that proved crucial in winning the Constructors’ Championship.
The courage to leave Red Bull during a period of great dominance
On May 30, 2023, the announcement was made official, confirming Rob Marshall’s move from Red Bull to McLaren. At that time, the Milton Keynes team was having an unprecedented season: it was the year Red Bull won 21 out of 22 races, while McLaren was going through a crisis that ended from the Austrian GP onwards.
“From my point of view, they asked me at the right time. I was at a point where I thought if I hadn’t changed teams then, I would probably have stayed forever. I was happy to stay there,” Marshall admits, recalling with affection his 17 years at Red Bull.
“However, things were starting to get too easy, a bit too comfortable. You knew everyone, you had to do everything. Now I’m happy to have left Red Bull the right way. You’d like to think that no one wants to be indispensable, but they clearly managed without me, which is great for them,” the chief designer states.
It seems, therefore, that in addition to McLaren’s noble history and the work of Stella and Brown, the search for new challenges played a decisive role in the decision to leave the comfort zone of Milton Keynes and join a team that hadn’t been fighting for the top positions in a long time.
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