Liam Lawson’s horror start to his life as a Red Bull Formula One driver just became a nightmare. The New Zealander was promoted alongside Max Verstappen when the team decided to end their association with Sergio Perez a year early.
The number two drive at the Red Bull F1 team is a notoriously difficult place to be successful given the direct comparison of the incumbents performance is with they greatest driver in a generation – Max Verstappen.
Lawson was bullish about his hopes for the year ahead following his promotion but came quickly down to earth at the season opener Australian Grand Prix. He failed to make it out of Q1 and then binned his RB21 into the wall just over half way through the race.
Lawson plumb last in Sprint quali
With the Chinese GP just days away Lawson was keen to get back on track and put his Aussie woes behind him. Yet in the only practice session of the weekend Lawson was languishing down in P18 with his team mate fairing little better jet two places ahead.
As the temperatures began to fall in the Shanghai late afternoon the frenetic Sprint qualifying was under way. Lawson had two attempts in the shortened SQ1 session to make it through, but despite his second run being quick enough to initially evade the drop, as the final runners crossed the line, Lawson fell like a stone on the timing sheets ending up plumb last when the chequered flag fell.
The margins over one lap were tight as demonstrated by Max Verstappen who was just eight tenths quicker than Lawson and in second place. Liam took to the radio after being told he had been knocked out explaining to his race engineer: “Mate, I’m really sorry but I just… I honestly could not get the tyres down.”
A clearly disappointed New Zealander faced the round of media interviews and explained the team’s strategy was to put in two cool down laps after his first push run to reduce the pressures and temperature of the tyres. Yet. By the time Lawson began his second quick lap the temperatures remained too high.
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Red Bull strategy didn’t help
When asked about his Sprint qualifying woes, Lawson replied: “Just the second lap, I went off, so, it’s obviously a shame. I think, from a starting point, it wasn’t too bad, the first lap was alright, and then we were just looking to build on there, but we stayed out to try and cool the tyres on track.
“To be honest, I really struggled to get the temps down starting the second lap, so basically, we started too hot and then through the lap, I just struggled. It’s frustrating.
“It’s really a shame, because honestly I think we started okay in quali, and first lap wasn’t amazing but it was relatively okay, so it’s just a shame to be out for something so frustrating,” reported the Red Bull driver.
“Our pace should be a lot further up than where we are, so obviously we have tomorrow’s sprint race to try and learn some stuff, and then tomorrow’s quali as well – we want to do a better job than this,” Lawson concluded.
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One bad session on track can happen to any of the F1 drivers but with the context of his performance in Australia, Lawson’s failure in Shanghai drew immediate comment. To make matters worse his team mate Verstappen was battling for pole position finishing just 18 hundredths behind the Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton who starts the Sprint at the very front.
In the post session analysis, Karun Chandhok of Sky F1 said: “The body language I’m seeing from Lawson, in contrast to Verstappen, he doesn’t have the confidence to attack the corner entries,” said Chandhok.
“He’s tentative, he’s nervous, he’s not comfortable or confident driving that car. It’s a clear sign of a driver who is not at one with the car.”
Prior to the first race in Australia, Chandhok had expressed concerned over Lawson’s potentially premature promotion by Red Bull and with Yuki Tsunoda, delivering last week and this for the Racing Bulls team, the choice between the Japanese driver and Lawson to partner Max has come under renewed scrutiny.
“Too soon” for Lawson
“They’ve plucked Liam in really too soon, I think,” Chandhok said in Bahrain. “I think they should, in an ideal world, have had Liam in Racing Bulls with a full season, with Hadjar as a reserve maybe. But they didn’t have the pipeline.” The Sky F1 commentator also talked of potential burn out for Lawson as as happened with others who have been given the monumental task of being Max Verstappen’s team mate.
Martin Brundle commentating on Sprint qualifying winced when the chequered flag fell at the end of SQ1 saying, “Ouch….Ouch for Liam Lawson.” And fans of Red Bull took to social media expressing their dismay at the situation Red Bull and Lawson find themselves in.
We Are the Races Joshua Suttill posted on X: “Properly worrying start for Liam Lawson. Thrown in at the deep end with such limited experience but I can’t think of a worse start to life at Red Bull.”
Another questioned: “Is it too early to say that Liam Lawson may be the worst driver Red Bull have ever had in one of their cars in their history?”
A third added: “Red Bull … just admit the mistake and put Yuki in as Max’s teammate.”
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Tsunoda stakes a claim again
Tsunoda in the Racing Bull had again out qualified Lawson and should their trajectories continue the Japanese driver will quickly make the case that it should be he who is alongside Max Verstappen and not Red Bull’s first choice driver.
McLaren CEO Zak Brown commented in Australia on how well Tsunoda had performed whilst questioning Red Bull’s decision making: “Yuki did a great job. [He is] probably the guy who should be in the Red Bull if you look at how he’s performed, but they seem to make some strange driver choices from time to time,” he told Sky Sports.
Red Bull have been ruthless in the past with their drivers, ditching Pierre Gasly during the summer break in 2019. He returned to the then named AlphaTauri team while Alex Albon was given the last nine races of the year for the team to “evaluate” his readiness for the role during the following season.
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Albon survived 2020 alongside Max but Red Bull then decided they wanted a driver with a proven track record to partner their star driver and so Sergio Perez took on the impossible task of being the team mate of Verstappen for the next four years.
It must be mentioned that Liam Lawson has never raced at either Albert Park or the Shanghai circuit in junior categories, something Christian Horner made note of. Yet the same is true for some of the rookies on the grid this year who have finished ahead of Lawson
For now the final word remains with Mark Webber, an F1 driver who also took on the impossible in being the team mate of Sebastian Vettel during his glory years. He suggested the scale of the task facing Lawson is like “trying to climb Everest without an oxygen mask.”
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As pre-season Formula One testing drew to a close, the conclusion amongst observers was pretty unanimous. McLaren were the class of the 2025 F1 field. Yet the results from testing are notoriously difficult to judge, given that certain teams did no qualifying simulations and others chose not to perform full tanks race simulations.
Yet come the Australian Grand Prix last weekend, the analysts were proved correct and the MCL39 is the car to catch this season. George Russell despondently noted that the papaya liveried cars had “such an advantage” that “they can stop development now and go fully on 2026”.
Although this is unlikely given in season F1 upgrades often deliver between one to two seconds of improved pace for the teams across the ten months of racing around the globe…. READ MORE ON THIS STORY
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This is a watered down version of a post taken down at another F1 website … the question needs to be asked, is there a reason Christian seems to be dead set against promoting a Japanese person?