Christian Horner admitted it is "very easy" to wind up rival Formula 1 team chief Toto Wolff as he revealed following Sir Alex Ferguson's approach to management.
Horner is a vastly experienced team principal having been in charge of Red Bull since the team entered the sport in 2005. To some he is a controversial figure, thanks to his penchant for provocative statements when speaking to the media.
That is not lost upon his Mercedes counterpart Wolff, who used it as a barb at the height of their rivalry last season. As Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton had their own battle, things escalated between their bosses which led to the Austrian describing Horner as "a windbag who just wants to be on camera".
Speaking to Sky Sports, the Red Bull boss let slip that he quite enjoyed going toe-to-toe with Wolff. "It's not personal in any way – Toto is Toto. He's done a phenomenal job with Mercedes. He's obviously come into the sport from a very different background to me, he's very much from a financial background," he said.
"And it's very easy to pull his chain, and you can see it. Sometimes it affects him. So of course when you're competing, and last year was so intense and of course it was the first time he'd ever been in that situation, it's always interesting to see how people react. When they're smashing headphones and so on, you can see that you got to them."
Horner's own popularity has blossomed, partly as a result of his forthright approach to interviews and heavy presence in Netflix documentary Drive to Survive. But he has just as many critics as fans – not that he lets that affect the way he chooses to operate.
Instead, he sees the example of former Manchester United manager Ferguson as one to follow when it comes to dealing with public perception. "If it bothers you, you shouldn't do the job – my job is to do the best I can for the team and the people I represent," he added.
"If I look at somebody like a Sir Alex Ferguson, I doubt he ever worried about what perception other managers or people thought about him in the sport. My priority and my prerogative is to do the best I can for the people I represent, whether it's with the promoter, the FIA, whether that's getting the right shareholders or sponsors, with the media, it's doing the best that we can with the tools that we have."
