In a startling revelation, McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown has taken a swipe at Red Bull’s driver selection strategies. Brown has voiced his belief that Yuki Tsunoda’s stellar performance at the Melbourne Grand Prix was misplaced in a Racing Bulls vehicle. Instead, he feels that Tsunoda should have been at the wheel of a Red Bull for the inaugural race of the F1 2025 season.
Upon Sergio Perez’s departure from Red Bull after the 2024 season, the challenge of choosing a new partner for Max Verstappen, notorious for his knack of outshining his teammates, emerged. Daniel Ricciardo, a former teammate of Verstappen, made a comeback to Red Bull with ambitions of rejoining the senior squad. However, his inability to deliver the desired performance led to his exit post the Singapore GP in the previous season.
Red Bull, not short of experienced drivers, had Tsunoda in their fold. After a four-season stint with their junior team, Tsunoda had outperformed Ricciardo. Yet Red Bull decided to bring onboard Ricciardo’s VCARB replacement, Liam Lawson. With merely 11 Grand Prix experiences under his belt, Lawson was chosen to accompany the defending four-time World Champion Verstappen.
The Melbourne Grand Prix, however, saw Lawson off to a rocky start, marked by a Q1 elimination due to a power unit issue. Meanwhile, Tsunoda secured a P5 qualification in the VCARB. These events triggered Zak Brown’s critique of Red Bull’s driver selection. Praising Tsunoda’s performance, he told Sky F1, “Yuki did a great job, [he’s] probably the guy that should be in the Red Bull if you look at how he’s performed. But they seem to make some strange driver choices.”
Lawson’s unfortunate spin-out in the rain-affected race and Tsunoda finishing P12 as the only VCARB driver left in the race, following Isack Hadjar’s crash, further exacerbated the situation. The next challenge for Lawson is the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai, also the first sprint weekend of F1 2025, which will test him with only a single practice session.
Reflecting on Lawson’s performance in the Australian GP, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner admitted, “It was a difficult weekend for him.” Despite the difficulties, Horner pointed out Lawson’s second-fastest lap time of the Grand Prix as a silver lining. However, he recognized the challenges Lawson faced due to missing FP3, leading to increasing pressure and subsequent mistakes.
Despite these hurdles, Horner expressed faith in Lawson’s resilience and insisted that the Melbourne weekend wasn’t a true reflection of his capabilities. He did concede that the upcoming sprint race at an unfamiliar track would be testing for Lawson.
Meanwhile, McLaren’s Lando Norris emerged victorious in Melbourne, edging past Verstappen to claim the checkered flag by a slim margin. Mercedes’ George Russell rounded off the podium, further intensifying the competition.
