Wheatley: “As a mechanic at Benetton I saw Briatore and Dennis, you must not have thought of becoming ‘one of them’”

The ranking offered impossible to refuse From the role of mechanic at Benetton to the control bridge of Audi directly below Mattia Binotto: Jonathan Wheatley ‘made a career’ in almost 40 years of F1 and when the former Ferrari contacted him offering him the possibility of becoming a central figure in the Four Circles company’s project, he did not miss this opportunity. Wheatley was sporting director at Red Bull and after having collected successes with the Milton Keynes team he decided to get involved by occupying the same position as Christian Horner (who was then relieved of his position a few months later and replaced by Laurent Mekies). “As a mechanic at the time of Benetton the team principals were Flavio Briatore, Ron Dennis, I never thought I would sooner or later become one of them – said Wheatley interviewed by Motorsport Week – it seemed like an unattainable goal. I never gave too much weight to my career, I always thought about enjoying every day in F1. I was very lucky to be identified from time to time as someone who could take the next step. Sometimes during the course of your career you receive important phone calls and that of Audi was one of those. Being a team principal of the Audi project is one of the most exciting things that can be said in a sentence.” Audi has already held the filming day of the R26 in Barcelona and on January 20th the entire F1 project will be presented in great style in Berlin.