Aston Martin address reports of ‘astronomical bid’ for Red Bull’s Adrian Newey

Aston Martin have moved to shut down rumours the team have made an ‘astronomical bid’ to try and recruit Red Bull F1 design genius Adrian Newey.

A recent report in Autosport claimed that Red Bull’s legendary car designer had been offered a “big-money contract” over the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix weekend.

The rumoured attempt to lure Newey away from Milton Keynes is viewed as the next part of ambitious Aston Martin owner Lawrence Stroll’s plan to turn his outfit into an F1 superpower.

It has also been suggested that such a move might help convince star driver and two-time world champion Fernando Alonso to agree a contract renewal with Aston Martin.

However, Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack appeared to rule out poaching Newey at the Japanese Grand Prix.

When asked by Sky if there was any truth to the reports of an ‘astronomical bid’ for the 65-year-old, Krack replied bluntly: “No.”

He added: “We have a very strong technical team with Dan [Fallows, technical director], with Tom [McCollough, performance director], with Luca [Furbatto, engineering director].

“We’ve been joined lately by Bob Bell. So we are quite happy with what we have at the moment.”

Newey’s importance to Red Bull was praised by Max Verstappen ahead of this weekend’s race at Suzuka.

"We have a lot of people working on the car right, so it's a whole team effort that has to come together,” Red Bull’s  three-time world champion said.

"Everyone's ideas get taken into account and you build the car that we have today, so yeah for sure, having someone part of the team like Adrian, I think it's a massive boost for everyone and many people work together to achieve the car we have today."