Red Bull appoint Tom McCullough as head of racing from 2027

On 1 September 2026 Red Bull announced it had appointed Tom McCullough as its head of racing, naming him as the successor to Gianpiero Lambiase. The team said McCullough will join at the beginning of 2027 while Lambiase is moving to McLaren to become their chief racing officer at an unspecified time by 2028.

McCullough, 50, has spent more than 10 years with the outfit now known as Aston Martin, including its previous incarnations as Force India and Racing Point. His CV also includes spells at Williams and Sauber. In January 2025 a restructure moved him off the F1 race team and into Aston Martin’s performance technologies division.

Red Bull described McCullough as a head-hunted appointment and said in a statement it "looked forward to the wealth of experience and expertise he will bring to the role" when he joins at the beginning of 2027. The head-of-racing position effectively runs all aspects of the race team under team principal Laurent Mekies.

Gianpiero Lambiase’s planned move to McLaren was confirmed in the announcement; the article described him as well known as Max Verstappen's race engineer and for the direct and unfiltered relationship between them through their team radio messages. The timing of Lambiase’s transition is set by Red Bull and McLaren as occurring by 2028 but no specific date was provided.

It remains to be seen whether McCullough’s appointment will ease negotiations between Red Bull and McLaren over a potential earlier release for Lambiase that would allow him to leave before the currently stated timetable.

McCullough will take up the head of racing role at the beginning of 2027 under Laurent Mekies, and Lambiase is due to move to McLaren as chief racing officer by 2028, subject to any agreement reached between the two teams.