New Kick Sauber Team Principal Jonathan Wheatley has promised to lead the squad “in my own way” as he explained what he has learned during the early days in his new role.
The Briton officially took on his position with the Hinwil-based team on April 1, having previously served as Red Bull’s Sporting Director, and made his race debut at the Japanese Grand Prix soon after.
Wheatley leads the management team at Sauber Motorsport AG, alongside Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technical Officer Mattia Binotto, with the Sauber squad undergoing a vast transformation ahead of their transition into the Audi works team from the 2026 season onwards.
With plenty of work to do on and off the track, and Nico Hulkenberg’s P7 finish in Australia the team’s only score so far in 2025, Wheatley insisted he was “re-energised” by his new position having been at previous employers Red Bull for 19 years.
Jonathan Wheatley appeared in the Bahrain Grand Prix press conference as Sauber’s new Team Principal for the first time
“There’s an energy in the company in this transition from Sauber to the Audi Formula 1 project,” he said when asked how he was settling in during the Bahrain Grand Prix weekend. “I feel like I’m in absolutely the right place, to be honest.
“My family and I, we’ve moved to Switzerland – an amazing country, which I had kind of driven through but never stayed in. Honestly, we’re making a home for ourselves, and I feel very, very at home at Sauber.”
For Wheatley, the project sees him complete another step up in his career as he takes on the role of a Team Principal for the first time, having started as a mechanic with Benetton back in 1991.
And for much of his F1 career, the Briton has worked with some high-profile team bosses – most notably the sport’s current longest-serving Team Principal in Red Bull’s Christian Horner.
When asked what he had learned from Horner – who has been at the Red Bull helm since 2005 – Wheatley responded: “I think I’ve learned from everybody that I’ve worked with in this business over the last 34 years.
“I wouldn’t focus particularly on one individual, because there’s a learning exercise in this job every single day. I’ve been open to learning, open to listening, watching how people react. People that you respect, people you’ve worked with for a long time – I worked at the last team for 19 years.
Wheatley worked at Red Bull for 19 years alongside team boss Christian Horner
“I want to be my own Team Principal. I want to lead the team, along with Mattia, in my own way. I’ve always been pretty sure of my own thoughts and my own views. I have a plan for how we can start this transformation journey and carry the momentum through. And I’ll keep referring to it but it’s about the people – the people in the team. That’s my focus.”
While Wheatley’s immediate priority will be on trying to get to grips with his new surroundings, much of the work in 2025 is with a view ahead to the transformation into Audi’s works outfit.
That in itself presents a challenge for the team’s new boss in marrying the different cultures of a three-pronged workforce – the Swiss-based team, the Audi engine base in Germany, plus a new UK-based technical centre that is due to open later this year – and he has insisted the squad will need to “get comfortable with being uncomfortable.”
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“What I’ve found is, at the moment, I’m not seeing any issues in terms of the language – the language of the team, the way people are getting on,” Wheatley explained.
“There’s an openness to learning. I’m going to try to learn German – but I don’t want anyone testing me on that in the short-term, please! It’s part of the challenge of the role and, as you know, we’re looking to expand our horizons a little bit.
“It’s a small team that’s in the transition phase to becoming a fully-fledged works Formula 1 team. There’s a myriad of projects that we need to get right. And one of those is meshing the people together.
“As a team, we need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable, because change is coming. We have to be at the forefront of that and we need to have a clear road map as to where we’re headed – and I believe we’re on that road map at the moment.”
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