Yuki Tsunoda will spend his fifth season at Red Bull’s second team this year after the world champions chose not to appoint him as Max Verstappen’s new team mate.
While Liam Lawson moves to Red Bull after just 11 grand prix starts, Tsunoda faces another season at their junior squad. Red Bull’s motorsport consultant Helmut Marko has revealed why the team picked a much less experienced driver than Tsunoda to replace Sergio Perez.“In terms of speed, Tsunoda is definitely the faster of the two at the moment,” Marko told Sport, but noted “he lacks the necessary consistency and continues to make mistakes.”
Tsunoda made his F1 debut with Red Bull’s second team, then known as AlphaTauri, in 2021. Although he has impressed the team with his speed on some occasions, they still have doubts over his composure.
At last year’s season-opening grand prix in Bahrain, Tsunoda reacted unhappily when his team ordered him to let team mate Daniel Ricciardo past as he was running on much softer tyres. Tsunoda almost caused a collision with his team mate after they took the chequered flag. Later in the year he was fined €40,000 for using offensive language on his radio when he was delayed by other drivers in the pits during a qualifying session.
Marko admitted Red Bull were concerned Tsunoda “slows down and loses his composure” when he gets rattled. “His outbursts of anger have improved considerably but remain an issue,” said Marko. “He loses control.”
Verstappen has emphatically beaten his last three team mates in Formula 1. Red Bull dropped Pierre Gasly after just 12 races alongside him while his replacement, Alexander Albon, lasted a year and a half. Perez spent four seasons at the team but even he lost the qualifying battle 80-7 alongside Verstappen.
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Marko said Red Bull were concerned how Tsunoda might react when faced with the challenge of measuring up to Verstappen.
“We believe it would cause significant emotional challenges for Tsunoda if he realised alongside Max that he couldn’t beat him, or perhaps even get close to him, and that things weren’t going as he had imagined,” he said.
Red Bull viewed Lawson as “the mentally strongest of our juniors,” despite his limited experience. “He has the mental fortitude to race alongside Verstappen and accept that he won’t be able to challenge the Dutchman,” said Marko.
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S
3rd January 2025, 7:37
So Tsunoda doesn’t like to lose…. A bit like Verstappen, then.
Anyway, they clearly think Tsunoda is good enough not to let him go to another team – regardless of the Honda connection.
Christopher Rehn (@chrischrill)
3rd January 2025, 7:42
I get that Max is a one of a kind superstar, but Marko is explicitly saying Lawson will not be a match for the Dutchman. If they so publicly acknowledge they haven’t got anyone who can come close to Max, why would they settle for anything less than trying to attract someone from the top teams?
Sainz was on the market, Alonso was probably on the market, Bottas was available. Perez measured up well to Verstappen to begin with, before trailing off. Offering another top driver a 1-year deal would still be enough to attract someone of that calibre in that car. Are they so afraid to upset Verstappen that they settle for less than the best available? This could cost them another constructors championship even if Max defends his title in 2025.
Armchair Expert (@armchairexpert)
3rd January 2025, 9:03
We are coming from a year which showed Max winning the title in third quickest car and you are still asking this question?
Sainz in 2024 had perfect reliability, yet he only scored 290 points, while the best possible actual results of both Ferrari drivers would account to 378 points, 4 more than Norris in the second place and that’s WITHOUT points for sprint races and fastest laps. Now add those missing points and of top of that Max driving the Ferrari and we are nearing 475 or more points. Easy Ferrari (or McLaren) title with Max in 2024.
Nobody on the grid can match or “upset” Max driving the same car. Lawson will unfortunately become the next GOAT’s victim and I already shudder to think about the hate and ridicule coming his way, the same as Perez suffered.
ECWDanSelby (@ecwdanselby)
3rd January 2025, 10:58
Because they don’t want anyone beating Max, just being closer to him than Perez was :)
osnola
6th January 2025, 12:22
The reality is there are no drivers available who can match verstappen. So comming close is the only choice left there..
George.be
3rd January 2025, 13:10
Marko said Lawson, who has limited experience is not a match for an experienced Max. That does not take anything away of what a polished Liam might grow into. As far as I can see, on average Liam was 0.05s slower than Yuki in Qualification, even less in the race. The average gap in Q between RIC and TSU was 4x larger, in the race they were equal.
Redbull made a good choice, IMHO: They have a known quantity in both teams, someone who has learnt to communicate with the team about how the car behaves, and in each team a new guy that can grow and evaluated against the experienced driver.
If I were in the Redbull meetings, I would push to keep the path for the junior series open to some extent. Chosing outsiders to fill the seats might wreak havoc in the future. Ask Alpine & Oscar what happens if a driver is held back too long.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
3rd January 2025, 23:08
To be fair though, piastri proved he’s not a top driver, he’s in the ricciardo tier when he was at his best, just below top driver level, after all they’re both australians!
Jungle
4th January 2025, 10:57
Jack Brabham and Alan Jones were both Australians so how does that match you’re correlation?
paul
4th January 2025, 23:46
Err, Max had 7 podiums in his 2nd year, Piastri had 8, seems like your “top driver” bar is too high.
George.be
7th January 2025, 10:18
Max didn’t have the best equipment under his bottom, but I agree, the bar set by @esploratore1 for ‘top level’ is stupid. I believe the level of the average of all drivers has risen the last few years, and together with the limited on track testing for new kids, it takes a bit longer to get on top off all details. It is easy enough to be fast, or have dependable and cheap-ish results (not crashing helps), or save the tires, but achieving the sweet spot of these three criteria has never been harder. Simulators and coaching help, but nothing helps more than experience.
Coventry Climax
4th January 2025, 1:47
What sort of ‘amazes’ me, is that when Marko says something, people usually say he’s talking nonsense, but then at times -when it suits their beliefs?- they react as if what he says is the all and only of what’s really (been) going on at Red Bull.
There’s a couple more people involved in the decision making than just Mark, they have data that we don’t have and it would be a mistake to think these people are all just dumb – apart from how that does their success injustice.
They might make decisions for reasons we don’t like, but I do still think it’s fair to say there’s always a background and a discussed decision once we get to know about it.
Oh, and I don’t think Bottas even remotely qualifies as a top team driver. Whether that’s ‘anymore’ or ‘ever’ isn’t very relevant here.
Let’s just wait and see how Lawson does, and I’m sure there’ll be people saying ‘just as I thought’ – as always.
Saggy
4th January 2025, 6:03
To the point we must understand that max races aggressively to everyone and when he’s having a far competitive teammate who’s capable of fighting for the championship, they both compete and would probably end up crashing like in 2021. We could expect a rivalry like vettel and webber or vettel or Charles maybe max and Daniel so, the team couldn’t afford crashes which may eventually challenge drivers title and constructors too. Just like liam is a rookie and he’s not expecting to fight off max, it might be a wise decision for redbull to have this.
Maybe Lewis and bottas type..
Jere (@jerejj)
3rd January 2025, 7:55
Nothing really to explain in the end & the mental strength aspect especially was obvious the whole time.
He didn’t mention Honda, not that he needed as that’s clearly been another factor.
pcxmac (@pcxmac)
4th January 2025, 20:34
It’s not Tsunoda’s mental strength that’s really being tested. And as an aside, why Russell will always be a better driver than Max, because he can and welcomes competition.
Stranded
7th January 2025, 11:30
Hilarious comment.
MacLeod (@macleod)
3rd January 2025, 7:58
The race when Yuki went ballistic was the proof they needed as it seems after that race they (Red Bull) gave up to have Yuki promoted as they didn’t want a teammate taking out Max for things he doesn’t agree too…
Addme (@dontme)
3rd January 2025, 9:04
Max actually loses composure more often than Yuki. But he is also a lot faster.
I find it stunning that Marko outright says Lawson is a docile nr2. I mean we all know this, but racers are competitive, they should believe against all odds that they have a chance to beat max.That is why I prefer Yuki. He will not just give up before the season starts. He will fight for it. And lose, but he will be at least feel he did everything he could.
Webbo (@webbo82)
3rd January 2025, 9:34
Well put, I came here to make the same initial point ☝️.
It’s not as if Red Bull Racing is the epitome of professional conduct in the paddock, is it?
XV
3rd January 2025, 18:07
Not sure that Marko is saying that Lawson is docile, but rather that he is more realistic in his ability to challenge Verstappen. Neither driver will have the measure of Verstappen. Marko believes Lawson will accept this and keep focus while Tsunoda won’t, with Tsunoda’s emotions affecting his composure and results more.
Anon
3rd January 2025, 9:46
the problem with lawson is that he is really slow in qualifying he’ll be as far back as perez was
Jonathan Parkin
3rd January 2025, 10:32
If Liam is still in the car at Abu Dhabi I will be surprised
Jungle
3rd January 2025, 10:07
From a spectator perspective I would of liked to see Yuki get the seat. He is fast but a bit of a wild card. So you’d imagine he’d be qualifying up near the pointy end of the grid.
All Marko/Horner needed to say was “hey ah listen run your own race but never, I repeat NEVER take out Max. On the other hand if you tangle with the odd McLaren, Ferrari or Mercedes at the start or late in the race….well ah yeah we’re probably going to be ok with that!”
Marcel
3rd January 2025, 10:37
The thing is, Tsunoda isn’t fast at all. He is in no way faster then Gasly, Albon or Perez were, so the package he brings is anger and not speed. Problem is, that is not going to change, because Tsunoda himself is very much convinced he is the next Max Verstappen. There is no garanty with Lawson either, but he might get better, were Tsunodo will most definitely not. Tsunoda is what Tsunoda is, a medriocre F1 driver with severe anger issues. Neither alone is a specific problem, but the combination of those 2 elements is.
El Pollo Loco
3rd January 2025, 21:03
The thing is that’s a pretty silly comment considering Yuki was out qualifying Perez in the RB fairly often and you have no way of proving that he wouldn’t be faster than Albon or Gasly. It only means Liam will be even slower than all of them if we’re going to base Yuki’s speed solely on his rookie season vs Gasly whose pace, by the end of their time together, he was pretty much on…
I’d bet on Yuki to be faster than Albon any day of the week let alone Perez.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
3rd January 2025, 23:26
Perez has always been bad in qualifying, so that’s likely.
Mahesh (@m47e57)
3rd January 2025, 11:00
well Marko is already discounting Lawson, which is fair to some extent though from what I have seen of Lawson’s personality, I do not believe he will accept being beaten. He is too young for that, too ambitious!
Looking forward to fireworks next season!
Jane (@janedone)
4th January 2025, 5:37
If Lawson does anything that they don’t like, they only need him to make one mistake to kick him out and let in Hadjar. They’re not looking for the fastest driver, just whoever will do a decent job and willing to roll over for Verstappen. Red Bull isn’t being wise about their future with this style of drivers management. They should be building up long term replacement for Max instead of banking on him staying with them for many years to come.
Edvaldo
3rd January 2025, 11:55
It’s A curious requirement : to have the mental strenght to be beaten and be fine with it.
If youre not fine with it, youre not good enough for the seat.
MichaelN
3rd January 2025, 17:10
Irvine famously had no qualms about saying Schumacher was faster than him during their years together.
It looked like Pérez had finally gotten the message earlier this year. Namely, that by doing his own thing it would be good enough for 2nd or 3rd places. On the other hand, going out of his way in a Quixotic attempt to beat Verstappen only led him down wrong paths and ruined many a race weekend in 2023. But “whatever happened” around Imola soon derailed all that.
Edvaldo
3rd January 2025, 20:19
Berger too.
Basically, they don’t want drama. They want to be able take pieces of one car and put in another if required (Mark Webber Bristish Grand Prix 2010) and the driver on the lesser end to be ok with it.
Davethechicken
4th January 2025, 17:16
Eddie was happy with the pay cheque. He had made a lot of money before F1 and made a lot more since too. A rather shrewd businessman who could drive F1 cars very fast to.boot.
But yes he was quite clear he couldn’t beat MSC, I wonder though if he knew the full details of the unique advantages MSC enjoyed at the time he stated that. Bespoke tyres as n example.
EffWunFan (@cairnsfella)
5th January 2025, 8:40
Have to admit that I had to look up “Quixotic”.
Whilst I now understand – and it is obviously a good thing to have an extensive lexicon – I’m sure other words would have sufficed (I am perhaps incorrectly assuming that I am not the only one that was a little stumped).
As a trivial aside, I could not establish why it would be capitalised as I couldnt see a proper noun equivilent.
David BR (@david-br)
3rd January 2025, 12:03
Mercedes: We’ve two brilliant drivers eager to compete with each other.
McLaren: We’ve two brilliant drivers eager to compete with each other.
Ferrari: We’ve two brilliant drivers eager to compete with each other.
Red Bull: We’ve one brilliant driver and another who’ll have the mental fortitude needed to accept we’ve chosen him because his slow enough not to compete with our number one.
It’s what makes Red Bull so lovable, I guess.
anon
3rd January 2025, 13:15
@david-br Red Bull and many of the senior management at the team have been rather open about the business model of the team revolving around commercialising their drivers and turning their drivers into the face of the operation.
Much as happened previously with Vettel, Verstappen’s role at the team fits that same mould – they have carefully created a particular image around him that they realise taps into a particular segment of the fan base that will pay a healthy premium to them for it. That then results in Red Bull having a higher focus on turning an individual – Verstappen in this case – into a commodity for the team and turning him into a brand that people want to associate themselves with for the profit of the team.
To that end, they’re pretty open that the best thing for their profitability is to maximise the success of Verstappen by having a team mate that won’t be too competitive and thus potentially take points from him or potentially upset the internal team dynamics. The more successful he is, the more powerful the driver centric narrative that they promote becomes and the more strongly his existing fans want to buy into that story (both figuratively and literally).
Jim from US (@jimfromus)
3rd January 2025, 13:23
I understand what you’re saying and Red Bull’s intentions but as a fan, it is too bad that Red Bull is intentionally putting a lesser driver in a top car. Only half of the teams have a competitive car so having 9 top drivers instead of 10 is 10% less competition.
David BR (@david-br)
5th January 2025, 12:59
But is brand Verstappen really enhanced by having such uncompetitive team mates? And is Red Bull’s image enhanced by having such an underperforming driver like Pérez for so long?
Not to overly prejudge Lawson – apparently it’s Marko and co who expect little real challenge to Max from him. Or maybe that’s written in the contract.
El Pollo Loco
4th January 2025, 23:12
lol, Mercedes put Bottas next to Lewis for five seasons…
Ferrari is one of the most famous teams ever for pursuing a number 1 driver format.
McLaren has been one of the few consistent exceptions. Williams too when they were competitive.
Davethechicken
5th January 2025, 8:57
I don’t see the “laugh out loud”
Who was better than Bottas for Mercedes to sign in 2017? You do recall the circumstances?
He had beaten Massa for 3 consecutive seasons, and has beaten all his other teammates convincingly both before and after Mercedes, aside form LH.
Do you think Riccardo was near Massa’s level? Massa was a highly regarded driver in his prime.
The situation at RBR is very different, as outlined already in this thread. It is in plain sight and has been all along. Money makes the world go round.
David BR (@david-br)
5th January 2025, 12:55
Still using ‘lol’ el pollo loco lollo?
It’s a point about the current era and this year specifically. Since 2022, Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes have all had fairly well-balanced teams, Red Bull have been the outlier with their one driver policy and Marko has simply confirmed their intention to continue with the same.
Adam (@rocketpanda)
3rd January 2025, 12:05
I will never understand the logic of promoting a guy that has had less than a season’s worth of races under his belt rather than the guy that’s been ‘training’ in your junior squad for the best part of 4 years. Or then commenting the new guy has better ‘mental fortitude’ when we openly watched him throw away his own race just to bully Perez and give him the middle finger. Like this fortitude… not seeing it yet my guy.
I do feel bad for Lawson in a way. It almost feels like they’re setting him up for failure, that he’s going to have to be spectacular just to change people’s minds now. A ‘solid start’ just ain’t going to cut it.
Jere (@jerejj)
4th January 2025, 14:55
Throw away his own race just to bully Perez?
More like the other way around between them & that’s when I made my mind fully clear that Perez should voluntarily leave for everyone’s, including his, sake.
El Pollo Loco
4th January 2025, 23:17
Marko and RBR are just full of it. They know this mental resilience thing is just an act to cover up the fact that they’re taking out their anger toward Honda on Yuki.
BTW, we’ve had this headline literally more than dozen times. If this isn’t just another quote taken from when the announcement was first made, why are Red Bull still saying this stuff over and over and why is it being reported again and again?
Le Jimster (@lejimster82)
3rd January 2025, 16:07
I think they’re trying to take the pressure off Lawson. I’m still expecting Lawson to spring some surprises tho. It is near impossible for him to be as consistent as Max with the experience gap, so he will have some ups and downs as he gets to grips with the new car. He will do better than most people believe tho, I feel like he is being written off before he’s even had a chance.
Tomcat173 (@tomcat173)
4th January 2025, 9:44
Agree with this. Red Bull obviously believe that whoever gets the drive is highly likely to be beaten by Max. Knowing that, they’re considering who’s going to handle the situation in the most mature manner.. and have given the nod to Lawson. Lawson has been around in junior formulas for quite some time, spent time in Super Formula in Japan etc, so there’s a good chance that he’s competitive in the Red Bull.. he won’t beat Max, but could be more competitive than Perez.
Gary
3rd January 2025, 16:30
It’s tiring to go over this issue over and over again but if we take ourselves back to the end of 2020 season when it was between Perez and Albon for the Red Bull seat there were concerns about Perez’s outright speed but he was apparently a good racer with experience who would be able to handle taking on Max better than a young Alex Albon that seemed to be struggling with the pressure.
It turned out that Perez’s lack of qualifying speed was a big issue and then he qualified down the field every race, got into incidents trying to make up places and gradually spiralled. Lawson is the same mould. As Marko says he’s not as fast, a couple of tenths in qualifying is the difference between Q3 and Q1 these days. Lawson will be another Perez quite simply because he is not fast enough – the other stuff doesn’t matter.
The jury is out on Tsunoda too by the way but as Marko states he is the faster of the two.
anon
3rd January 2025, 17:53
Gary, if you look at the cases where Perez went out in Q1 or Q2, the gap between his qualifying time and that of Verstappen in the same session was often more than just “a couple of tenths” slower.
In Imola, his Q2 time was over 0.5s slower than Verstappen, whilst in Canada it was closer to 1.0s (albeit influenced by the weather as well). In Spain, the gap in Q2 was 0.4s behind Verstappen, Q1 in Hungary saw him 0.8s off, Singapore 0.9s saw Perez behind in Q2 (albeit only 0.5s off in Q1), Q1 in Mexico saw Perez 0.8s behind Verstappen and Q1 in Las Vegas saw Perez around 0.9s behind Verstappen.
The race where you could make the strongest argument that Perez was “a couple of tenths” slower and was knocked out in Q3 whilst Verstappen went through would be Monaco, where Perez was about 0.35s slower – although that is starting to get towards the upper end of what some might consider “a couple of tenths”.
Gary
3rd January 2025, 21:00
Not sure you understood my comment and the point being that Perez was too slow in qualifying in general and always had to come back through the field which affected his races and caused a lot of incidents. My point was that Lawson is also bad in qualifying so will likely have similar traffic and incident issues.
The argument that he was a solid racer with experience and mental fortitude completely fell apart when he spiralled. Maybe you’re right it was more than a couple of tenths but I think the argument still stands that you cant afford to go for a slower driver in qualifying these days because the field spread is so tight and getting stuck in traffic screws your race.
Look at Russel vs Hamilton this year, Hamilton clearly raced better but Russel always started in a better position and had a much smoother ride.
anon
4th January 2025, 7:47
Gary, it’s more of a disagreement about the nature of your argument.
Your argument is that “he qualified down the field every race, got into incidents trying to make up places and gradually spiralled” due to being “a couple of tenths off”, but the times that he qualified far down the grid were times when he was substantially off Verstappen’s pace, not just “a couple of tenths” off in qualifying trim.
In several of those races where he went out in Q1 or Q2, Perez hadn’t been particularly competitive during the simulated race stints in practice either, pointing towards a more systematic underlying issue with his performance that impacted on the consistency of his times, not just the outright pace. To me, therefore, the poor qualifying performances in those races were not so much the cause of Perez’s problems, but rather a result of the wider problems that Perez was having in 2024.
Paul
4th January 2025, 19:28
Liam has beaten tsunoda and albon in his short career. And out qualified max once
El Pollo Loco
4th January 2025, 23:21
He never even out qualified Yuki. So, not sure you how you’re defining beaten Yuki let alone Albon? How did he beat Albon?
Edvaldo
5th January 2025, 3:36
Outqualified Max in Singapore 2023? That means nothing.
He’s probably going to be an improvement over Perez, but he didn’t earn that seat, it’s like Kvyat taking Vettel’s seat over Vergne but even worse because Kvyat at least had a full season of experience.
Esploratore (@esploratore1)
4th January 2025, 0:49
I suppose this reasoning makes sense, both lawson and tsunoda are head and shoulders below verstappen in performance, so being able to cope with being beaten is required, else you get another perez; bottas was also suffering later in his mercedes stint performance wise.
They could’ve taken sainz, he would’ve been better than either toro rosso driver, and he wouldn’t have caused issues with verstappen, just like he didn’t with leclerc, who, if anything, is not as consistent as verstappen, but since they’re apparently averse to the slightest bit of team competition, this at least explains why lawson over tsunoda.
Sham (@sham)
4th January 2025, 8:16
He could just have said ‘this is Red Bull’ and left it at that.
I don’t care who their second driver is, frankly, because they will always back the one – it’s like Schumacher’s Ferrari.
It’s bought them a lot of success, so they won’t change it. The problem they have is if their lead driver decides to up and leave, they’re left high and dry. Teams like Mercedes, McLaren and modern Ferrari don’t have that problem – but they have to manage 2 egos.
You pick your pain when you’re running a team, and Red Bull choose to do it this way – the biggest problem I can see with it is the lead driver believes he is bigger than the team, because that’s how they treat him. Look how Vettel changed his attitude after leaving Red Bull after being the biggest spoilt child on the grid for years. I hope Max has another side to his character, and I guess we’ll see in years to come.
His father doesn’t, and they’re scarily alike.
Tomcat173 (@tomcat173)
4th January 2025, 9:49
Yep, people keep wanting to like the decision Red Bull have made, and wanting it to be fair to Tsunoda.. but the success they’ve had with their current approach, cutting drivers quickly, putting all of their eggs in the Verstappen basket makes sense and works for them.
I think Max has already shown that he thinks he’s bigger than the team. That’s only be a problem if the car Red Bull build is not competitive & there’s no trend toward it improving over the course of a season.
MichaelN
4th January 2025, 16:44
This approach is perhaps a bit overstated because that’s how it turned out.
Red Bull wanted to keep Webber when he was quite close to Vettel, but he never got to grips with the Pirelli and wasn’t the same from 2011 onwards.
Red Bull wanted to keep the Vettel and Ricciardo combination, but Vettel left to Ferrari.
Red Bull wanted to keep the Ricciardo and Verstappen combination, but Ricciardo left to Renault.
That’s when they got into this curious situation with their own talent being found wanting (Marko’s business) and tried a whole slew of drivers and ended up with what is effectively a one-man team. They even brought back Ricciardo to see if he still had it – but quickly found he did not.
Their excuse for not picking up Sainz was that Pérez was doing well at the start of the season. It’s not totally incorrect, but it’s a bit disingenuous all the same as Sainz is in every way a clear upgrade over Pérez. But other than that, it’s mostly the failure of Marko’s talent program that has led to this situation, not so much a reluctance on Red Bull’s part to have a strong pairing.
El Pollo Loco
4th January 2025, 23:25
Well put, Michael. A clear illustration that their driver pairings have not worked out by design and have often failed to work out.
Sham (@sham)
5th January 2025, 7:33
The reason Ricciardo left was because Verstappen was clearly favoured and he thought he could do better elsewhere, and Webber was treated like dirt and only didn’t leave because no top team wanted him at the time.
I agree about the lack of Red Bull Junior talent, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t always favour one driver – they have ever since golden boy Vettel showed up, and it took leaving Red Bull to make a human being out of him. With Verstappen, we’ll see. I don’t see much to like about him at the moment, but we’ll see.
Jungle
6th January 2025, 12:31
Weber also got hit by a car and broke his leg in a charity bicycle race somewhere in the middle of all this.
Paul
4th January 2025, 19:46
Lawson will win a race this year!
jaja Binks
5th January 2025, 2:09
yes LL will surprise everyone mid year and leave for Aston Martin were the real winners will be in 2026
Haas Khan (@haas918)
5th January 2025, 15:03
I wanted Yuki to race for the Red Bull in 2025 but now when they have decided to go with Lawson, I hope the rookie can perform decently in the upcoming season and lasts the whole season as Red Bull Racing driver.
VIETVET
6th January 2025, 3:36
I thought the basic strategy was simple: build the fastest you can and make a couple of copies. Then hire the two fastest drivers you can. If everything goes right, you win. If half of it goes right, you can still win. Red Bull’s problem has been they built the fastest car but it was so quirky that only the best driver on the track could make it work, and they never did find a second that could do the same. All the discussion about ego management, being hired to lose, etc etc, including speculation about the products and worth of a drivers academy, is BS. You never know what’s going to roll out of your own factory at the beginning of the season, much less nine others. As Red Bull will find out soon enough, they should have followed the basics. Max is Max and will always take care of himself. The other guy should have been the best that RB money and prestige can buy. Anything less is either hubris or plain foolishness.
Honda
6th January 2025, 21:26
Taking their average quali times differences from last year.
In US Yuki was +0.065, +0.456 both times slower in Q1 so average comes to 0.2605secs. Using the same metrics Yuki was faster in all others occasions.
Mexico -0.273, -0.198, -0.033 which comes to -0.168secs
Las Vegas -0.298, -0.469, -0.590 which comes to -0.452secs
Qatar -0.098, +0.009, -0.052 which comes to -0.047secs
Abu Dhabi -0.132, +0.002, -0.380, -0.053 which comes to -0.140secs
In Brazil wet they were doing multiple laps on varying track condition so taking their Q3 time only come to -0.373secs. Which I think is fair because in race as well it was around -0.3secs per lap on average.
In 2023 as well the gap was similar from 0.1 to 0.4secs depending on the track.
Since he has 1-11 record against Yuki in quali I think it is reasonably safe to assume it will be 0-14 against Max by summer break. Obviously they are expecting pole or wins I think Marko said the gap should be with in 0.3secs. I think it will come to down to have fast and easy the car is to drive.