Christian Horner revealed why Red Bull chose Liam Lawosn over Yuki Tsunoda as the replacement for Sergio Perez.
On the 18th of December 2024, it was officially announced that Sergio Perez would not drive for Red Bull Racing in 2025 as he agreed with the Austrian team to take a one-year break before he further decided about his future.
At that point, it was clear that his replacement would be one of the RB drivers: Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson. Both drivers deserved the promotion, but the Austrian team ultimately decided for Lawson.
On December 19th, Red Bull confirmed that Max Verstappen's teammate for 2025 will be Liam Lawson, which was a decision that outraged many (mainly Yuki Tsunoda) fans.
An argument for why Tsunoda should have gotten the 2025 Red Bull seat:
The Japanese driver first outperformed Nyck de Vries in 2023. De Vries was then replaced by Daniel Ricciardo, who was supposed to beat Tsunoda in order to be promoted to Red Bull, but that didn't happen.
RB then replaced Ricciardo with Liam Lawson in the middle of 2024, who was supposed to beat the Japanese driver, but he didn't manage to do it as well. What reason did Red Bull have to promote Lawson over Tsunoda? As quoted by ESPN, Christian Horner said:
"It was very, very tight between the two of them. I mean, Yuki is a very fast driver. He's got three or four seasons of experience now."
"He did a very good job in the tire test for us in Abu Dhabi where the engineers were impressed with how he performed."
Argument for why Lawson was the right choice for Red Bull:
Although many F1 fans suggest what happened was unfair to Yuki Tsunoda, they tend to forget that Lawson outperformed the Japanese driver in five of his 2023 races.
However, when it came to the decision of who would get the full-time seat, RB chose Tsunoda. At that point, it was the New Zealander who felt injustice. However, everything always has its reason.
Christian Horner had a couple of reasons as to why he ultimately chose the less experienced F1 driver over the one with four seasons under his belt. He said:
"With Liam, when you look and go into the analytics of his race, pace was slightly better in the races that he did."
While the Kiwi driver was beaten in a head-to-head qualifying battle with Yuki Tsunoda 0-6, Horner suggests the gap between the two is not as big as this stat might make it seem. He continued:
"His qualifying pace was very tight with Yuki, and you've got to assume that the potential with Liam having only done 11 grand prix, is he's only going to get better and stronger. He's shown real mental resilience and toughness."
"A couple of things have stood out with me with Liam - how versatile he is. You put him into a situation, he gets on with it. If you remember his debut in Zandvoort after Daniel broke his fingers, he was racing against Max on his out lap."
"He's got that kind of gritty racer mentality. He did a year in the DTM where he adjusted to driving a Ferrari GT car incredibly quickly alongside."
"Alex Albon and generally had the upper hand. And again, his racecraft has been really one of his key strengths."
"So he's not afraid to go wheel-to-wheel and even rub wheels where necessary. So I think he's going to do a great job for us."
"The engineers have enjoyed working with him through the running that he's done this year. He's got a good work ethic as well."
Although Red Bull ultimately chose to promote Liam Lawson, Horner added it doesn't mean that the doors are closed forever for Yuki Tsunoda.
"So it is great to have Yuki still involved with the Racing Bull scene next year. And, of course, he's on standby should he ever be required."
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