Red Bull has decided to drop Liam Lawson after just two starts for the team, multiple publications are reporting.
French Formula 1 broadcaster Canal Plus and Dutch newspaper de Telegraaf are among those claiming the shock change will happen before the next round of the world championship.
Both named Racing Bulls driver Yuki Tsunoda as Lawson’s replacement. Tsunoda would therefore start his first race for Red Bull in his home event at Suzuka.
RaceFans has approached Red Bull for comment.
Red Bull announced Lawson as Sergio Perez’s replacement after the end of last season. But his position at the team was thrown into doubt after his poor performances over the first two rounds.
Lawson was eliminated in the first round of all three qualifying sessions he participated in, including the sprint event in Shanghai. He crashed out on his debut in Australia, having stayed on the track on slick tyres when a shower hit the track. Although he climbed from last to 14th in the sprint race last weekend, he made less progress in the grand prix after starting from the pit lane.
The 23-year-old admitted he found Red Bull’s car difficult to handle. He started the last race from the pit lane after choosing to make changes to its suspension set-up in the hope of finding a better balance.
“We made the decision to take him off the grid, out of parc ferme, to try some radical changes on the set-up because you’re so limited in testing with these cars,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner told Sky after the race. “It made sense to say, okay, look, we’re starting at the back, let’s try and learn something out of the day.
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“We’ve done that. We’ve got 56 laps’ worth of information with a radically different set-up on the car. Again, that gives huge information back into the factory, back into that system as we’re looking to improve our performance in the forthcoming races.”
Asked whether Lawson would have further time to work on his difficulties with the car, Horner said: “Formula 1 is a pressure business, isn’t it? There’s always time pressure and he knows that. Hopefully, he’ll respond accordingly and we’ll see where we go.”
Lawson joined Red Bull from their second team, Racing Bulls, where he was Tsunoda’s team mate over the last six races of 2024. Red Bull has previously swapped drivers between its two teams, notably when it promoted Max Verstappen in place of Daniil Kvyat in 2016, and are expected to return Lawson to Racing Bulls.
This article will be updated.
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