Christian Horner shared a story about his wife from when she was in the Spice Girls.
Former Red Bull team principal Christian Horner has shed light on his personal life in his new book Drive, opening up about his early meetings with wife Geri Halliwell. The couple have been married since 2015 and have a son together. However, before their relationship began, Geri had a very different existence as one fifth of the Spice Girls. One of the most talked-about incidents of her girl band era involved a meeting with King Charles, who was at the time the Prince of Wales. Now, nearly 20 years on, Horner has confirmed his wife broke royal protocol in her interaction with the now head of state.
In 1997, Geri and her bandmates met the then-prince at the premiere of their film Spice World. At the time, it was reported that she had pinched the royal’s backside, though she maintained she had merely patted it. “Patting him on the bottom was against royal protocol but we’re all human,” she told The Times in 2016. Now, 10 years on from that admission, her husband has corroborated her account.
Christian and Geri first met in 2009 at the Monaco Grand Prix but the singer made a big impression on their second encounter at a lunch also attended by Roger Taylor from Queen, and Richard Jones from Stereophonics, “Geri immediately put everyone at ease,” Horner wrote.
“She teased Richard about why he had his name tattooed across his neck (‘I don’t know,’ he replied), and the conversation flowed effortlessly. She had a natural warmth and confidence, and she treated everyone the same, whether they were royalty or a road sweeper.
“It was entirely in keeping with the person who, in 1997, had hugged Nelson Mandela and, later that year, famously ignored royal protocol by patting Prince (later King) Charles on the backside at a Prince’s Trust gala.”
Horner said he could tell there was something between him and Geri even then, though they didn’t act on it immediately. It was only in 2014 that they went on their first date, and the ex-Red Bull chief insisted it couldn’t have gone better.
“On our first date, I remember being at dinner, looking at my watch and realising we’d been chatting for hours,” he added. “At times, it had felt like we were the only people in the restaurant.
“When I walked Geri to her car, I noticed she had three different satnavs on the dashboard of her Lexus. The exterior was a war zone and from what I could tell, there wasn’t an undented panel on the body work. It looked like the Millennium Falcon.
“Despite working in Formula One, I was still naive to how the world of celebrity media worked. I hadn’t yet been exposed to the notoriety that Drive to Survive would bring.”
Geri insisted she only patted, not pinched, the King’s rear