Adrian Newey has committed to ramping up his Formula 1 workload back to "full-time".
Although widely credited for Red Bull’s recent successes and dominance, the 65-year-old has not worked full-time on F1 for several years now.
"He is going to be full-time," Aston Martin team owner Lawrence Stroll declared on Wednesday, as Newey’s sensational switch of allegiances was finally announced.
The Silverstone based team explained that Newey’s new title will be ’managing technical partner’ once he starts work in March next year, including an ownership stake.
Billionaire Stroll said the Briton will be "fully dedicated to providing his leadership and direction to the team".
"He will be technical partner, leader of the technical team and a leader within the company as a partner and shareholder. So I will let him decide the structure, as he knows more than me."
Newey confirmed that his new role will be full-time.
"I’ll be fully in. I need to be. I have to be," he is quoted as saying by El Mundo Deportivo newspaper.
"I want to be at the centre of everything, in the thick of it. Changing teams is a big commitment to try to understand how everyone works, to be involved in how things take shape. That takes time and commitment, so yes. Once I start, I will be 100 percent committed."
However, although admitting that he has had other projects at Red Bull including the Valkyrie hypercar, Newey hit back at claims that his F1 schedule was limited to just three days per week.
"I don’t know where the rumour about three days a week came from," he insisted.
"I’m not here to talk about Red Bull, but it’s well known that in 2014 we were in a position where we didn’t have a very competitive power unit and there was no light at the end of the tunnel. That’s where I thought I needed to get involved in something else. And then the Valkyrie came along," said Newey.
"Once we had Honda, we were in a very different situation and that’s when I got fully involved on the F1 side again," he added. "It’s a very mature team now and I feel that once we got through the big rule change in 2022, I could take a step back and withdraw a little bit because 2023 was an evolution of 2022 and so with 2024.
"But this is something different, a new challenge," Newey added, referring to Aston Martin. "It’s a new stimulus. And I always do what I think is necessary for the good of the team."