Adrian Newey opens up on the motivation behind building the Red Bull RB17 hypercar

Red Bull Chief Technical Officer Adrian Newey claimed that the motivation to build the RB17 was to avoid creating another Valkyrie-like hypercar that he had designed for Aston Martin as he wanted to do something different. The aero wizard, along with Red Bull team principal Christian Horner, unveiled the hypercar on day two of the Goodwood Festival of Speed.

The RB17 was a pet project of the 65-year-old, as he began working on it in late 2021 after delivering the Aston Martin Valkyrie hypercar.

In his exclusive interview with F1.com, the iconic aerodynamicist revealed some key reasons behind taking the project on and the motivation behind it.

"I guess there’s a number of years I’ve been in F1 that to keep myself fresh and avoid going stale, I feel sometimes I need other projects to kind of give inspiration and so forth so that when I’m in F1, I’m not feeling as if I’m always doing the same thing," Newey said.

"The Valkyrie was the first project in that mold, then I kind of started to think what can be the next project? I didn’t want to simply do Valkyrie 2, it had to be something different. I pondered that for quite a while."

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Adrian Newey provides an update on his future in F1

After successfully delivering the RB17, Adrian Newey officially completed the final task for the Red Bull and closed the chapter with the Milton-Keynes outfit as had already stopped his F1 duties ahead of the Miami GP this year and announced his departure after 19 years with the team.

The former Williams and McLaren designer joined the Austrian team in 2006 and delivered seven Driver's and six Constructor's championships ever since.

As quoted by the aforementioned source, Newey spoke about not paying attention to the reports of him potentially joining other teams on the grid for next year as he was focused on taking a vacation with his wife, Amanda.

He said:

“I have to admit, I don’t read the press very much, but of course I hear [things]. Amanda, my wife, kind of follows it and gives me a rough update, so yes, it’s very flattering, of course.”

“Ultimately, it’s not why I do the job. From the age of 10 or 11, I always wanted to be a designer in motor racing, and I’ve managed to achieve that, so everything else is a bonus really. My passion has always been trying to add performance to cars, to race cars, so the rest is, of course, part of it, but it’s not what wakes me up and motivates me.” he added.

Teams such as Ferrari, Aston Martin, McLaren, and Williams F1 have reportedly made their approach to hire Adrian Newey for the 2025 season. Although, despite several rumors linking him to teams on the grid, Newey has maintained his stance of not deciding on his future before the autumn/winter time.