Geri Halliwell kisses scandal-hit husband Christian Horner in huge show of support at F1 amid sext storm
GERI Halliwell has broken cover in Bahrain to stand by her husband Christian Horner despite the couple being rocked by his Red Bull sext scandal.
The Spice Girl, 51, landed in Bahrain on Thursday night but had since been laying low amid fears more bombshell messages could be leaked.
Despite the storm surrounding her marriage with scandal-hit Horner, Geri decided to show up for her husband as the pair were pictured together at the Grand Prix.
Mobbed by photographers, the pair climbed the steps to the hospitality unit.
Geri and Horner were said to stay inside for a few minutes before speaking with guests outside on the patio area.
The couple then went back inside.
Pictures also showed the husband and wife sharing an intimate kiss moments before the opening race of the season.
The Spice Girl went for her signature white outfit, which she is known for wearing at F1 races.
It comes as
- Horner broke his silence after the string of shock texts to a female colleague were leaked.
- Geri Halliwell’s marriage to Christian Horner is said to be “in question” following the sext leak
- The Spice Girl is said to have “felt like a fool” after Horner played down sexting claims
- Geri was “left humiliated” as she faces the “worst PR crisis of her career”
- A mole close to the Red Bull Racing camp allegedly detonated the Christian Horner sexting scandal in a bid to oust the F1 team boss
- The Red Bull Racing boss was cleared of sending improper texts to a female employee a day before the bombshell leak
- Formula One chief Mohammed Ben Sulayem broke his silence after his showdown with Christian Horner.
- Max Verstappen breaks silence on boss’ sext scandal and admits he’s “distracted”
It comes after Geri was said to have “felt like a fool” for trusting her “prince charming” husband after he played down sexting claims.
The singer is now facing “the biggest decision of her life” as she is deciding what the next move in her marriage with Horner will be, her friends said.
She will most likely bunker down in the couple’s Cotswolds country home and make her decision behind closed doors, the Daily Mail reported.
Friends of the star reportedly stated it would “break her heart” to end things with Christian, whom she considers the “Prince Charming” she has waited for since she was a little girl.
An insider said: “She acts on impulse a lot. She has a temper on her, that’s for sure, and doesn’t Christian know it.
“But the question now that her inner circle is asking is whether Christian will be sent to the dog house for a few days or whether this is it for good.
A source close to the pop star, who was on a Bahrain-bound private jet when the messages emerged, told The Sun Horner tried to play down the scandal.
They said: “Geri is heartbroken and feels utterly humiliated. She trusted him when he tried to play down the scandal.
“He always told her he’d done nothing wrong. This will really hurt Geri, who has put everything into their marriage.”
“She worked hard for all of this, she jumped through hoops to get him, so will she dump him?”
It is understood Geri went “into meltdown” when she landed in Bahrain to discover Horner’s sext leak.
Her concerned pals added she seemed “fragile” when they saw her a few weeks ago.
Earlier today, a smiling Christian Horner appeared to have shrugged off his sext scandal as he arrived alone at the Bahrain Grand Prix.
The Red Bull Racing chief was pictured focused and ready to take on the 2024 Formula One season.
But soon after his star driver Max Verstappen said the team principal is “probably a little bit distracted” as he faces more questions over his sext probe, Sky News reported.
He said: “It’s not our business.
“When I look at how Christian operates within the team, he has been an incredible team boss, so absolutely from the performance side of things, you can’t even question that.
“So that’s what I am also dealing with. I speak to Christian a lot, and also of course throughout the weekend here he is fully committed to the team.
Verstappen added: “He’s also here for the performance, of course probably a little bit distracted, but like I said before, we just focus on the performance things and that’s how we all work together.”
Horner said he “won’t comment on anonymous speculation” after material reported to have been part of Red Bull’s recent inquiry into him was leaked.
The racing chief previously refused to comment on the leaked WhatsApp sexts, which were sent anonymously to F1 bosses and media outlets on Thursday.
How Christian Horner's shock texts were leaked
By Ben Hunt
IT was an anonymous email sent and designed for maximum impact.
It landed in my inbox almost 24 hours to the minute since Christian Horner was cleared of any wrongdoing following Red Bull’s internal investigation.
Other names included Liberty Media chief Greg Maffei, who owns the rights to F1. The FIA president, Mohammed Ben Sulayem and F1 CEO Stefano Dominacali.
The F1 team bosses were also included for good measure. As was Max Verstappen’s father, Jos.
It was from an anonymous sender, the title was simply the date – ‘Feb Twenty Nine’.
Inside it was a Google Drive link containing 79 files claiming to be the evidence from the independent investigation.
There is no way of knowing if they were real or fake yet irrespectively it sent another shockwave through the F1 paddock before this season had even started.
Horner was sitting on the team’s pitwall during second practice in Bahrain when the email dropped.
After the session, he walked out of the team’s garage and into the hospitality unit where he remained as the nuclear fallout began.
He’d survived the outcome of the internal investigation into improper conduct following a complaint from a female colleague.
One wonders whether he will survive this time after this very public humiliation – again, irrespective if they were indeed real or fake.
Just hours earlier, McLaren’s CEO Zak Brown and Mercedes boss Toto Wolff, called on the sport’s governing body, the FIA, demanding transparency.
“I just read the statement, which was pretty basic,” said Wolff. “My personal opinion is we can’t really look behind the curtain.
“There is a lady in an organisation that has spoken to HR and said there was an issue and it was investigated and yesterday the sport has received the message that it’s all fine, we’ve looked at it.
“I believe with the aspiration as a global sport, on such critical topics, it needs more transparency and I wonder what the sport’s position is?
“We’re competitors, we’re a team and we can have our own personal opinions or not. But it’s more like a general reaction or action that we as a sport need to assess, what is right in that situation and what is wrong.
“Are we talking with the right moral approach, with the values based on the speculation that is out there? As a sport, we cannot afford to leave things vague and opaque on critical topics like this, because this is going to catch us out.”
Brown added: “It’s the responsibility ultimately of the organisers of Formula One, the owners of Formula One, to make sure that all the racing teams and the personnel and the drivers and everyone else involved in the sport are operating in a manner in which we all live by.
“I don’t think it’s the teams’ roles and responsibilities. That’s up to FIA and Formula One to ultimately decide and ask what they feel gives them the level of transparency they need to ultimately come to their conclusion and we just have to count on them that they fulfil that obligation to all of us.”
The emailed file will only increase that pressure in the form of scrutiny on Horner – who has always denied the accusations.
It does also put Red Bull in a tricky position.
Should the emailed file be legitimate and have made up elements from the initial report, which had been thoroughly examined and presented by the independent KC, then surely this is nothing new to them and their decision to stick with their team principal remains.
To perform a u-turn on that simply now they have become public would possibly see criticism that they intended to keep their report private to save face.
Whatever the outcome, it is a mess for the world champions.
Reports of a wedge driven between Horner and Verstappen’s father have grown in recent weeks.
So it was interesting that Jos Verstappen was in the paddock and wearing a team jacket and seemed unmoved to the chaos happening around him