Sports writer Matt Majendie spent a full season embedded with Red Bull Racing, documenting the team’s chaotic 2025 campaign for his new book Inside Red Bull Racing: A season with F1’s most thrilling team.
Majendie has since been sharing candid observations from his time inside one of Formula 1’s most high-profile operations, lifting the lid on some fascinating character studies.
He recently appeared on the Road to Success podcast to discuss how the relentless pressure of the sport affects different personalities across the Red Bull garage.
One of the most striking revelations concerns technical director Pierre Wache, who Majendie describes as perpetually operating at maximum stress levels regardless of the situation on track.
“One of the most stressed individuals I’ve ever seen is Pierre Wache,” Majendie said. “The technical director, he always looks stressed. He wears this great sort of Gallic look of looking under pressure and stressed, even when maybe the pressure’s not so there.”
Majendie recalled a notable moment when even Max Verstappen felt compelled to calm his technical director down over team radio during what appeared to be a pole position lap at Imola.
“There’s a point when Max, I think, gets a pole maybe at Imola when he basically says on the race radio, ‘Chill out, Pierre’, which I thought was quite funny because obviously he’d been stressing whatever.”
Away from Wache, Majendie also highlighted another individual within the team who carries a colourful unofficial title, a man known internally as the tyre whisperer.
“He’s the guy in charge of Max Verstappen’s tyres,” Majendie explained, naming Greg Reeson as the man behind the nickname, alongside Paul Monaghan, after observing a tyre deflation drama at the Abu Dhabi season finale just before qualifying.
The contrast between those high-anxiety individuals and the team’s strategists proved equally compelling, with Majendie singling out Will Courtenay and Hannah Schmitz as models of composure under fire.
“They feel like there’s the highest pressure because they’ve got to make these calls. At this moment, you’ve got to pit now. VSC, safety car, whatever happens. They’re making those calls, and I’m so impressed,” he said.
Majendie noted that while stress manifests visibly in some team members, others are capable of projecting remarkable calm even during the most intense moments of a race weekend.
The book offers a rare and unfiltered perspective on the inner workings of a team that navigated significant turbulence throughout 2025 while continuing to compete at the sharp end of the championship.