In the summer of 2014 Adrian Newey signed a new contract with Red Bull Technology ending rumours of him switching to the troubled Ferrari team. But this new contract was really the end of the Englishman’s career as a designer of racing cars. From late 2014 onwards Newey will focus on ‘other projects’ within the Red Bull operation, and will only have a consultancy role in the creation of future Red Bull grand prix racing cars.

Adrian Newey has been designing cars since 1983 and the following article looks back at each of them, but you first have to look at the early days of his career.

Even with his apparent step back from day to day design work in Formula 1 most Formula 1 teams still dream of hiring him, indeed for most of them it seems inconceivable that you would even think about firing him but but during Newey’s long and fascinating career he has been, expelled, asked to leave and outright fired.

Our story of Adrian Newey’s career does not start with a hiring but instead a firm request for his immediate departure. As a teenager Newey attended the historic Repton public school (at the same time as Jeremy Clarkson) but was asked to leave after he high-jacked a school concert soundcheck and blew out a stained glass window.

From his Repton expulsion Newey headed to college in Leamington-Spa, in the Midlands region of England. There he gained a National Diploma in engineering. This was enough for him to get a place at University of Southampton to study Aeronautics and Astronautics (a Newey designed spaceship anyone?).

The 1980’s – From F1 to Sportscar racing to F1 again via the Indy 500

Newey finished university with a first class honours degree, having written thesis on ground-effect aerodynamics. His first job was at Fittipaldi Automotive as Chief Aerodynamicist on the F8 of 1980.



The car was not a great success and by 1981 Newey had joined March as a race engineer. Here, not for the first time, for the first time, he was asked to leave. At one race Christian Danner wrongly believed his car hadn’t been given enough fuel. Newey recalls: “In fact, the problem was a fuel leak, I’m glad to say. But anyway, in the immediate aftermath I was fired, basically and the driver asked if he could have a different engineer!”

He did not leave the fold at March however and after success engineering Johnny Cecotto in the European F2 championship Adrian Newey designed his first car.



The March 82G GTP – This was the first car to be designed by Adrian Newey, albeit under the direction of Robin Herd. It featured a reworked BMW M1C aluminium monocoque and was powered by a 5.7 litre Chevy engine. Like many later Newey designs the car had an aerodynamic trick up its sleeve, a gaping hole between the front fenders that fed the air to the massive under body Venturis. This unusual shape quickly earned the March the nick-name ‘lobster-claw’. It won two IMSA GTP titles (and raced on in 83G & 84G trim).



Newey then turned his attention to the Indy 500 and penned the March 85C, the design was popular with teams and it won its second race, the ‘500 itself. At the end of the year the CART championship was won by the Newey design.



The feat was repeated in 1986 with Newey’s next car the March 86C but despite this success it was to be the English designers final Indycar. Part way through the season Newey joined the FORCE F1 team. Here he worked beneath another British engineer, Ross Brawn. The two would go on to become great rivals but this dream team failed to deliver and the team closed at the end of the season, Brawn headed to Arrows and Newey went back to Indycar. They would meet again.

After a brief spell with Newman-Haas race engineering Mario Andretti’s Hanna Car Wash Lola Newey returned to March to design his first ever Formula 1 car.



The Leyton House liveried March 881 was the fastest normally aspirated car of the 1988 season and even finished on the Podium three times, a third position at the Belgian Grand Prix was followed by a second place in Portugal. Powered by a 3.5 litre Judd CV V8 it was enough for 6th place in the constructors championship. The car was carried over to the following year and it again finished on the podium, with third place in Brazil the opening race.



Newey was struggling though, the 881 was only racing because his next F1 car was not ready. When it finally made its track debut it was clear that it was not nearly as good as his first, the Leyton-House March CG891 did not score a single point in 1989 and had numerous retirements.

The 1990’s – Grand Prix dominance

The decade did not get off to a great start for Newey, the new Leyton House March CG901 was better than the 1989 car, and its managed to get itself on the podium twice, with a second at the French Grand Prix a high point. But frequent mechanical failures and even more frequent DNQ’s saw Newey, who by now was Technical Director fired from the Leyton House team.



Almost immediately Newey was hired by the Williams team as Chief designer, where he set about creating his first legendary F1 car. The Williams FW14 was the first Adrian Newey design to win a World Championship Grand Prix at the 1991 Mexican Grand Prix with Riccardo Patrese at the wheel.



It went on to be one of the most successful F1 cars ever, with seven wins in 1991 and ten the following year (in B spec). It even graced the cover of the second ever issue of Racecar Engineering! Renault issued this nice mini documentary about the cars construction, well worth watching just to see how things have been changed.

The Williams era for Newey was the start of a long period of evolution that defined his career from then on. Only major regulation changes have halted that process of constant evolution that became his trademark.



The Williams FW15 was meant to make its debut in 1992 but the FW14B was so strong the team did not decide to run it. The FW15B only ran in testing having been adapted to the 1993 regulations. The version that raced was the FW15C which had ABS and a smaller fuel cell. It was again dominant.



The Williams FW16 is sadly best known as the car Ayrton Senna died in. It was an evolution of the FW15 without the now banned driver aids. In the hands of Damon Hill the car was very strong indeed and won the constructors championship. This period also marked the start of the long running rivalry between Newey and Ross Brawn, then the Technical Director of the Benetton team. With Michael Schumacher working alongside Brawn & Rory Byrne the rivalry was especially hard fought and later defined the careers of both engineers.



The events of 1994 saw the introduction of a new set of technical regulations reducing the engines displacement to three litres and reducing the cars downforce. This meant that Newey had to restart the evolution process with the Williams FW17. It was not a match for the Benetton B195 but still scored five wins, but no titles.



With Michael Schumacher leaving Benetton for Ferrari Brawn lost one of his key advantages and Newey’s Williams FW18 was dominant winning all but four races in 1996. This was the last season at Williams for Adrian Newey as he had agreed to join the McLaren team in 1998. It meant that he sat out some of the 1996 races and many of those in 1997 on gardening leave.



Before Newey left Williams he had penned a new car for the team, the Williams FW19, though he had no hand in its development. Despite this it was another championship winner, with Williams narrowly beating Ferrari where Brawn & Byrne had been re-united with Schumacher. The rivalry was heading into its hardest fought period and with Newey heading to a new team he would not have it all his own way.



The McLaren MP4/13 was Newey’s first design for the Woking team and it was a great start. The car took both titles in the 1998 season winning nine out of sixteen races, but ominously all of the rest (bar the crash strewn Belgian GP) were won by the Ferrari line up of Schumacher, Brawn & Byrne.



1999 was one of the closest fights between the rival engineering teams, Newey’s McLaren MP4/14 would battle all year long against the Ferrari F399 of Brawn & Byrne. The Italian car had a chassis failure at Silverstone injuring Schumacher and leaving team mate Eddie Irvine to fight against Newey’s design. Ferrari would take the constructors title but McLaren took the drivers crown.

The 2000’s – Losing the battle with Brawn



The following years car, the McLaren MP4/15 was a race winner but could not quite match the pace of the Ferrari, it narrowly missed out on the title.



It was trend continued in 2001 with the McLaren MP4/16, which netted only four wins and was totally outclassed by the Ferrari. There were rumours of rows between Newey and McLaren boss Ron Dennis. It was clear that Newey was not that settled at McLaren and part way through the season it was announced that he was set to join the Milton Keynes based Jaguar team. But McLaren boss somehow persuaded Newey to stay.



The McLaren MP4/17 was Newey’s next creation but it was largely unsuccessful he now admits that this family of designs took the wrong direction. When it was realised that the concept was flawed much engineering effort was switched to the following years car, but this was a difficult process and when the new car failed to appear it meant that the MP4/17 completed two full seasons. At the end of 2003 the ’17’ had started 33 races an won only three, making it Newey’s least successful car since he was fired by March. Despite this it was a championship challenger in the hands of Kimi Raikkonen.



One of the reasons that the MP4/17 was not that competitive was that much of Newey’s time was dedicated to the McLaren MP4/18 the first in a revolutionary new family line of cars. It was plagued with problems, structural failures were frequent, and the car suffered a number of very large accidents. It also had cooling problems due to the tight sidepod design. In the end it never raced.



The problems with the ’18’ seemed to carry over into the McLaren MP4/19 which was described as a ‘debugged’ version of the unraced car. But in the first ten races of 2004 it retired frequently and never threatened the podium. Things improved later in the year but with only one race win and a 5th position in the constructors championship this was another low for Newey.



Another new concept was developed for the McLaren MP4/20, with a major aerodynamic rule change and the time was right. Newey appeared to be returning to form, and the car scored ten wins, but that was still not enough to beat the resurgent Renault team, but it did best Ross Brawn at Ferrari.



But things took a turn for the worse again in 2006 with the McLaren MP4/21 failed to win a single race but did manage a distant 3rd place in the constructors championship, behind Ferrari. It was Newey’s last McLaren with the relationship with the team still strained. It was thought that he would retire from the sport or design an America’s Cup challenger but in late 2005 it was announced that Newey would be joining another team in early 2006. He had finally decided that the time was right to head to Milton Keynes and the former Jaguar team, now called Red Bull Racing. McLaren apparently were not happy, but the deal was done.



Having taken both Williams and McLaren to multiple title wins in the 1990s, Newey’s challenge, when he joined Red Bull Racing for the 2006 season, was to do the same for a young team determined to challenge the status quo at every opportunity.



In 2007 his first design for his new employers, was not a great success, as the Red Bull RB3 it scored just one podium finish, and as the Ferrari powers the Toro Rosso STR2 it fared even less well. This design sharing also riled many rival teams who claimed the arrangement was illegal.



For 2008 that arrangement continued regardless and Newey’s design became both the Red Bull RB4 and later the Toro Rosso STR3. In Renault engined Red Bull trim the form was little improved with no wins and a single podium.



However fitted with a Ferrari engine and Toro Rosso transmission an Adrian Newey designed Formula 1 car won a race for the first time since 2005 this times in the hands of a young German named Vettel.



After his first two cars for the team, RB3 and RB4, made steady progress, Newey seized upon a comprehensive set of rule changes for the 2009 season to pen the Red Bull RB5, which brought the team six wins and second place in the Constructors’ Championship. It was also built into the Toro Rosso STR4. It was the start of a family line of cars that were to become utterly dominant. But for 2009 the title went to Newey’s old rival, Ross Brawn with his self named car.



2010’s – The return to dominance



In 2010 next year Newey and his team went one better than they did in 2009 and, with nine wins, the Red Bull RB6 took the team’s first Constructors’ title and with Sebastian Vettel at the wheel also brought home the Drivers’ title. From that point until 2014 no other designers car won either world championship.



2011 was, of course, even more successful. Tweaking the DNA of the previous year’s car, the Red Bull RB7’s consistent performance across all circuits allowed the team to take back-to-back Constructors’ and Drivers’ titles, thanks in large part to the designer’s unflinching desire to be the best and an uncanny ability to exploit possibilities invisible to others.



The Red Bull RB8 of 2012 was not as dominant but was still able to take both titles, and people began to ask just who could beat Adrian Newey.



The Red Bull RB9 was another step forward and it was again dominant, using cunning KERS technology the car had much better traction than its rivals and by the end of the season no other car came close.



2014 brought in a major new rulebook for powertrains and Red Bull, by now tied long term to Renault suffered badly as the Mercedes powered cars swept all before them. Until at the Canadian Grand Prix the Red Bull RB10 finally managed to win a race. It could well be Newey’s final Grand Prix winner as it was revealed that he would no longer be involved in the day to day design work for the team.

Is this the end?

By the end of the 2013 season it had become very clear that Newey had grown deeply frustrated with Formula 1 claiming that the regulations were becoming too restrictive and that the sport was slowly morphing into a kind of ‘GP1’ rather than the open engineering rules that he craved. His arch rival of many years Ross Brawn had retired at the end of 2013 too.

After weeks of speculation Red Bull Racing revealed that Newey was to stay with the organisation but would take a step back from designing Formula 1 cars. A short statement from the team read:

Red Bull is pleased to confirm that it has extended its successful relationship with Adrian Newey with a new multi-year agreement.

As part of this new agreement, Adrian will work on new Red Bull Technology projects, as well as advising and mentoring Infiniti Red Bull Racing as it develops its Formula One cars over the next few seasons. The details of the new projects will be announced in due course.

It is thought that the most likely of these projects is the long rumoured Americas Cup project design. One of the big things that differentiates Formula 1 from almost all other sports, with perhaps the exception of the Americas Cup, is that combination of man and machine, you can have a great car with an average driver and you won’t win, a great driver with an average car you won’t win. It’s about both.”

Newey who attended the Americas Cup event when they were held in Valencia, has wanted for a long time to design a challenger for the ‘Auld Mug.’ “If you take motorsport as a global umbrella of competitive man and machine as a sport, where else is there where you have significant budget for the engineering side? The answer really is only in the Americas Cup” he enthuses when asked about it.



Newey has worked on a number of projects outside of the Formula 1 team over the years including the creation of a extreme concept racing car called the Red Bull X-2010.

The F1 car for the road?

Newey’s step back from F1 is not a complete withdrawal from car design at Red Bull Racing, the Red Bull RB11 still has his name at the top of the design credits and the team claim that this was very much one of his cars.



It was not an especially successful design however, the first Newey design since 2008 not to score any victories, though much blame for this failure was placed at the door of power unit supplier Renault. The 2016 RB12 still had some Newey input but really was more of a Rob Marshall design.

Newey however had not been idle, he had been working on a new production car for Aston Martin, the AM RB-001. The radical looking composite chassis design is powered by a mid mounted 5.2 litre V12 normally aspirated engine and probably a hybrid system.



The power to weight ratio of the car will be 1:1, 1 bhp per kilo of weight, which is not as good as current LMP1 or Formula 1 ratios hwoever the team behind it claim that the on track performance level will be in line with that of today’s LMP1 cars. Others in Aston Martin have claimed that the car will be able to lap some circuits in times close or better than current F1 cars.

Speaking about the project, Newey revealed that while he was certain that while the car concept could deliver extreme F1-like pace, it essential that that car also featured GT-like levels of comfort and capability.

“I’ve long harboured the desire to design a road car. The formation of Red Bull Advanced Technologies brought me a step closer to realising that ambition, but I believed we should work with an automotive manufacturer. Aston Martin was at the top of my list,” he said. “I’ve always been adamant that the AM-RB 001 should be a true road car that’s also capable of extreme performance on track, and this means it really has to be a car of two characters. That’s the secret we’re trying to put into this car – the technology that allows it to be docile and comfortable, but with immense outright capabilities.”

The car will apparently be offered in two variants, a very limited run of street cars (only 99-150 examples) and a more track focussed version which may or may not be used for competition.