“Ultimately, there was a crash at the Nurburgring and I got into a disagreement with Franz when I came back to the pit box. I love Franz, he had a tough job, and really what this comes down to is my patience for being there and taking anything… I was over it. I was smarting off, I’m sure I was being disrespectful to Franz, and we had a little altercation on the pit road.
“The next weekend they replaced me and put Sebastian Vettel in the car, but I think it mostly stemmed from me not being happy in the situation. It was pretty clear that they wanted to get Sebastian in one of our cars, and I was basically the first one to raise my hand and say, ‘You can have it, good luck!’ It’s tough.”
“Carte blanche” from Red Bull’s boss
So, a year and a half after arriving in F1, Speed was on the sidelines.
It would not be a complete separation between driver and company, though, with Red Bull co-founder and owner Dietrich Mateschitz giving Speed the opportunity to remain part of the family and represent them elsewhere.
“Red Bull, being the incredible company they are, were willing to keep me on with their programme,” he says. “After Sebastian got in my car, they waited a couple of races to see where he was going to run. When he ran in a similar place, I got a call to see Didi and, bless his heart, he gave me carte blanche and asked me what I wanted to do.
“When I was unsure of what Red Bull were going to do, I did look at other options and started lining other stuff up in F1, but as soon as I met with Didi and realised that they were still behind me, it was a no-brainer. I wouldn’t have a racing career without Red Bull, and they’ve given that opportunity to so many athletes.