'Adrian Newey didn't know what he was doing - I never wanted to work with him'
Adrian Newey is regarded as one of F1's greatest-ever minds, but one former driver was not convinced.
Former F1 driver Christian Danner has revealed that he did not want to work with Adrian Newey during his career. The German previously raced for minnows Zakspeed, Arrows, Osella and Rial, making a total of 36 Grand Prix starts.
After kickstarting his junior career in the German Racing Championship touring car series, Danner graduated into Formula Two, spending his first two campaigns at the level with the March racing team.
This squad was the home of a young Newey, who was cutting his teeth as a race engineer and learning the motorsport ropes. The Essex-born brit was on the stand for Danner at just one race - the round at Silverstone in 1981 - before his driver requested a change.
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In an interview with Formula Scout, Danner explained: “I’m the only person in the world of motor racing who has ever said I don’t want to work with Adrian Newey, which is kind of a rotten privilege. But both Adrian and I are still laughing about it.”
He later added: “I didn’t want to work with Newey and I told him: ‘Adrian, you’ve got no experience, I’ve got no experience, this is not going to match’. He was very unconcentrated. He [once] forgot to unplug the radio, and he didn’t know what he was doing on fuel consumption.
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“He was just a young designer, you know? So, I ended up with Ralph [Bellamy] running my car and Adrian ended up with [Johnny] Cecotto. It was Cecotto, myself and [Corrado] Fabi, who eventually won the championship.”
Since Danner’s rejection, Newey’s career has come on leaps and bounds. After serving his time as a race engineer for March, he moved on to the team’s sports car project, producing a title-winning IMSA machine before transitioning to American open-wheel racing in CART (now known as IndyCar).
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Newey then graduated into F1 with March in 1988 and in 1991 he joined Williams, where his reputation gathered steam. In the three decades that have followed, his cars have won 12 Drivers’ Championship titles and a further 13 Constructors’ Championships, marking him as the greatest aerodynamicist in the sport’s history.
In 2025, Newey will embark on a new challenge. He signed a multi-year deal with Aston Martin after calling time on his Red Bull career, where he will team up with Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll in an attempt to bring titles to a fourth F1 organisation.
