The Red Bull team principal, Christian Horner, has indicated Liam Lawson has an opportunity to make his case to replace Sergio Pérez and line up alongside Max Verstappen for the team, potentially as early as next season.
Horner said they dropped Daniel Ricciardo for Lawson at their sister team RB, because the Australian had failed to prove he was in good enough form to step up, leading the team to give the young New Zealander a chance for the rest of this season.
Ricciardo, who had a successful stint with Red Bull between 2014 and 2018, had been placed at RB with a view to proving he was up to speed and ready to replace Pérez should the Mexican’s poor form continue.
However, while Pérez remains well off the pace, Red Bull did not believe Ricciardo had done enough to warrant replacing him, so Horner opted to look to new young talent to potentially step up.
The 22-year-old Lawson was the Red Bull reserve driver and will join RB, alongside Yuki Tsunoda, for the final six rounds of this season, beginning at the US Grand Prix on 20 October. Speaking to the F1 Nation podcast Horner explained why the team chose Lawson, in an indication that Pérez is now on his last chance with the team.
“All the drivers are under pressure to deliver but the reason why Daniel was in that car was to get himself back into a position to ultimately be there to pick up the pieces if Checo [Pérez] didn’t deliver,” he said. “We need answers for the bigger picture in terms of drivers. It’s the perfect opportunity to line Liam up alongside Yuki, to see how he performs over the remaining six grands prix.”
Despite Verstappen leading the drivers’ world championship by 52 points from McLaren’s Lando Norris, Red Bull have been passed by McLaren in the constructors’ championship and trail by 41 points, largely because Pérez failed to score sufficiently in what was a dominant car at the start of the season.
Red Bull extended Pérez’s contract earlier in the season in the vain hope it would give him the confidence to deliver. He has not taken a podium since China, in April, and is eighth in the championship. That contract is understood to include a clause that allows the team to drop him if he is not within 100 points of Verstappen, which he remains well short of. However, despite an expectation he would be dropped in the summer break, Red Bull opted to continue with the Mexican.
Red Bull’s director of motorsport, Helmut Marko, had made his feelings clear after another poor run for Pérez in Spa. “Sergio had the opportunity to take a good result from second place,” he said. “Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Especially in the last stint, he completely collapsed.”
Horner confirmed that Marko had also been critical of Ricciardo’s form leading the team to explore other options, although that Tsunoda has not been promoted already indicates the team do not consider him a candidate.
Instead Red Bull have opted to put their faith in younger drivers with Horner also mentioning the Red Bull juniors Isack Hadjar and Arvid Lindblad, as well as being hugely impressed by the performances of the youngsters Oliver Bearman, for Ferrari and Haas, and Franco Colapinto, for Williams, this season.
“Obviously we’ve got a contract with Sergio for next year,” Horner said. “But you’ve always got to have an eye out in terms of what comes next. Is that going to be Liam? Or do we need to look outside the pool? Or will one of the other juniors step up in the fullness of time, whether it’s Isack Hadjar or Arvid Lindblad?”