24 November 2023 , 12:33
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Adrian Newey admitted watching his father change after retirement has put him off walking away from Formula 1 any time soon.
The sport has been blessed with some brilliant design minds over the years, but Newey might be the biggest genius of them all. Signing him may be the best decision Red Bull ever made and Newey has gone on to design six constructors' title-winning cars for the team since.
This season's RB19 is the most dominant of them all with Newey leading a very successful design team along with technical director Pierre Wache. So he still has plenty to contribute a few weeks shy of his 65th birthday.
"Retirement is a funny thing, isn't it?" Newey told the BBC when the topic was raised. "If you'd asked me when I was 50 if I would still be working now, I would have said: 'No, absolutely not'. And then, of course, things come up, and you think, 'I'm actually enjoying it and what else would I do?' I'd get bored lying on a beach."
He pointed to the fact there are plenty of people who continue to work in motorsport at much older ages than him right now as an example that retirement doesn't have to be something that happens soon. And he also has his own personal reasons to be reticent about walking away.
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Newey explained: "Two of the people I most respect are [former F1 supremo] Bernie Ecclestone and [US racing legend] Roger Penske, both of whom are still working at quite a ripe old age and are still very mentally agile.
"I asked both of them, because I know both of them reasonably well, what's their secret? And they both said: 'Don't stop working. Think of your brain as a muscle that needs exercise.' And I do agree with that from other observations.
"Unfortunately, my father retired at 65, and kind of ended up a little bit lost afterwards, I suppose. I don't think he'd mind me saying that. So I am conscious of all these things.
"Equally, F1 is a very involving sport. I still love it. I have been fortunate enough to be doing what I wanted to do from about the age of 10 - ie be an engineer in motor racing - so while I still enjoy it, I would like to still be involved."
Newey recently admitted that, at one point, he was tempted to join Ferrari on one of the several occasions on which the Italians approached him. But he explained that concerns over moving his family always got in the way and that, "if I were 20 years younger", he might now consider it.