Red Bull advisor Dr. Helmut Marko has admitted that he “can still imagine” Lando Norris driving for Red Bull, but not Lewis Hamilton.
A seat at Red Bull is set to be vacant in 2025, due to Sergio Perez’s contract expiring at the end of next season.
Whilst Perez has the chance of being offered a new deal, he faces a lot of competition it seems for the seat.
Team principal Christian Horner has already revealed that the team will consider drivers outside the Red Bull family, meaning it’s not just Perez and Daniel Ricciardo who’ll be considered.
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Norris has been linked to the Austrians multiple times in the past and is someone who gets on well with Max Verstappen, something which could go in his favour.
However, with his McLaren deal not expiring until the end of 2025, he wouldn’t be able to move to Red Bull until 2026 at the earliest.
Fernando Alonso and Hamilton have both also been rumoured as possible Red Bull contenders, although both suggestions are certainly very unlikely to happen.
Marko seemingly wouldn’t allow either driver to join the Austrians anyway, with the 80-year-old believing each team needs a clear number one driver.
Hamilton and Alonso both wouldn’t settle for a number two role alongside Verstappen, which Perez arguably has currently.
Marko used the example of when Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost were team-mates at McLaren, with the pair having collided at the 1989 Japanese Grand Prix.
Neither driver in that case would settle for second best, something a team sometimes needs one of its drivers to do.
Hamilton in particular would be a frosty partner for Verstappen, although Marko recognises that the media would “love” to see the pair together.
“The public, the TV viewers and the journalists will certainly love that,” Marko told Motorsport-Magazin.
“But we as team management want success and we want to win the championship – if possible both the Drivers’ and Constructors’.
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“Then it is better if you have a hierarchy, where it is clear who is the clearly faster number one and who is the number two driver.
“[Lando] Norris I can still imagine but with Hamilton as a teammate, I have a hard head.
“The whole team atmosphere and our performance should not suffer. In the past, we saw, for example, Senna and Prost, two superstars, who only looked at each other and put the team in second place.”