Christian Horner says he has had “tremendous support” from his wife Geri despite the allegations of “inappropriate behaviour” made against him earlier this year.

On the eve of the 2024 season, it emerged that a female colleague had complained about Horner and that the Red Bull parent company had launched an investigation. The long-serving team principal and CEO strongly denied the claims and he was later cleared by an external KC hired by Red Bull to look into the matter.

Following that verdict, messages supposedly between Horner and his accuser were leaked to journalists and senior figures within the sport. The complainant was later suspended by the team and told it was because she had been found to have been dishonest.

She exercised her right of appeal but eventually, in early August, Red Bull Racing confirmed that it too had been dismissed by a second independent KC. The situation often overshadowed what was happening on track, even if Red Bull and Max Verstappen were still dominant in the early stages of the year despite it all.

Now, speaking to RacingNews365, Horner has paid tribute to the support he received which helped to make that happen, both within the race team and from his wife, Spice Girls singer Geri Halliwell. He said: “You’ve got to stick to your own principles and beliefs.

“I had tremendous support from within the team. Whilst there was a lot of noise in the paddock, whenever you cross the red line into the garage, it was business as normal.

“You never give up, you find out who your friends are and 100 percent [I didn’t consider stepping down], but it is a year I wouldn’t like to repeat. I think sitting here in December with the results that we’ve achieved is testimony to the strength and depth that we have in the team.

“I just believed in myself and the process and and my focus was to ensure that we kept winning, and we kept kept delivering. I’ve had tremendous support from my family and my wife and at the end of the day, that’s the most important thing.

“It’s certainly been a challenging year, but we’ve seen our driver defend his fourth drivers’ world championship, have won nine Grand Prix, qualified first nine times – even though he didn’t start from pole position nine times – and have won four sprint races.

“It’s been a strong campaign from the team, and particularly from Max, to get those kind of results, which are more wins than any other team in the pit-lane. Sometimes in adversity, of course, others look to capitalize on it, but it does galvanize the team and I felt that’s what happened this year.”