Red Bull advisor Dr Helmut Marko has revealed that he gave three-time World Champion Niki Lauda “information” back in 2012 that Lewis Hamilton was on the market, with Red Bull having hoped that the 38-year-old would leave McLaren.
Red Bull viewed McLaren as a bigger challenger than Mercedes at the time, meaning they viewed Hamilton as a “threat” whilst he was at the Woking-based side.
The hope was that Hamilton and McLaren would struggle if the seven-time World Champion left, especially to a team like Mercedes who were a midfield competitor at the time.
Of course, Marko sharing the information with Lauda ended up being a “complete misjudgement”, with Hamilton having gone on to win six world titles since he moved to the Brackley-based team in 2013.
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“I gave him some information that Lewis would be available,” Marko told Sport Bild magazine. “Of course I was not being altruistic.
“At the time, we thought Lewis would be less of a threat to us at Mercedes than at McLaren, for whom he was driving at the time.
“In retrospect, that was a complete misjudgement, although at the time it was really not foreseeable. But with the knowledge I have today, I would definitely not do that again.”
Incredibly, it was Lauda’s desire to sign Hamilton which made the Stevenage-born driver reluctantly leave McLaren, whom he claimed the title for in 2008.
“People told me to stay at McLaren – even my dad,” Hamilton recently shared.
Moving to Mercedes has ended up being the perfect move for Hamilton, with the star driver having gone on to claim 103 wins and 103 pole positions in F1.
Had it not been for his move to the Silver Arrows, then perhaps he would’ve never reached the record-breaking feats, and perhaps he would’ve never claimed seven world titles.
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As a result of his move, he’s gone on to be regarded as one of the greatest F1 drivers of all-time, alongside the likes of fellow seven-time World Champion Michael Schumacher.
The likelihood is that Hamilton will end up retiring at Mercedes in the coming years, with the driver seeing the Germans as his “family”.
With that in mind, some might have to question whether Hamilton in a way has Marko to thank for the move to Mercedes, given that it was his info which altered Lauda.