Looks like Webber is joining Red Bull Racing

[FourWheelDrift]

GP.com said:

Mark Webber will join Red Bull Racing next year. The confirmation of the deal is expected within the next couple of days. This is bad news for Christian Klien as david Coulthard is expected to be confirmed in the second Red Bull seat and that means that the Austrian driver may find himself out of work in F1.

Hmmmm, Newey designed chassis, possibly Renault power. Might be a good move. It frees up a Renault seat for Raikkonen if he doesn't stay at McLaren or join Ferrari.

[muzzer79]

I disagree.

Mark's 29 years old now. He joined Jaguar in the hope that he could build it into a winning team, that didn't happen and he moved to Williams with their BMW power to get results.
Now that hasn't happened either, he needs to move to a team where he'll be winning straight away - that means McLaren, Renault or Ferrari.

Red Bull may do well in the longer term but if Mark wants to be World Champion he needs to move to one of the big three to avoid being left out in the cold.

[kevin ritson]

Effectively he's back where he was before joining Williams. OK it's a team on the up but will they have progressed enough even with Newey on board? It takes a while to bring up a team's strength.

[jacobyte]

I have an inkling that RBR will be embarrassing some of the more established teams next year. Bear in mind that DC and AN have together developed several championship-winning cars in the past.

Edited by jacobyte on Monday 7th August 14:01

[rubystone]

I think Webber's a very good driver indeed and he was very close to a Renault seat several months ago before Carlos Ghosn started rabbiting on about getting a top 3 driver in the seat. For the life of me I cannot understand why Flav confirmed Fisi so early on - Webber had performance clauses in his Team Willy contract which freed him up to look elsewhere and Flav already had the headache of Kovalainen's contract for 2006 containing a clause that Flav would find him a race drive for 2007.

Maybe Pat Symonds has a bigger say than Flav?...If so, don't be surprised when Flav announces his departure from Renault within the next month or so.

I agree with those who think that Webber's no further forward now than when he joined Williams. Newey admitted at the Design Museum recently that the regulations are so restrictive that there is a limit to the influence a designer can bring to bear in terms of major advances in lap times...can Red Bull really produce a front-running car without a factory engine partner?