Verdict: What we think Red Bull should do with Liam Lawson

With only two rounds of the F1 2025 season complete, we have our first rumbles of potential driver movement.

And the driver in question is Red Bull’s Liam Lawson, after a point-less start to the campaign and clean sweep of Q1 exits. But is his time already up? Should Red Bull keep faith? Let’s debate.

Liam Lawson at Red Bull: Time up or race on?

Jamie Woodhouse

If a seasoned pro like Sergio Perez could no longer handle the Red Bull machinery and pressure, it always felt like a tall order to ask someone with just 11 grands prix of experience in Liam Lawson to rise to that challenge.

Even Pierre Gasly – promoted to Red Bull after a season-and-a-half in the junior F1 team – got that call to race alongside Max Verstappen at a time when Red Bull themselves suggested was a bit premature, but necessitated by Daniel Ricciardo’s exit.

So, should they stick with Lawson? I believe he needs to return to Racing Bulls, with Yuki Tsunoda finally getting his chance in the Red Bull after multiple snubs.

It is hard to see what the team has to lose. Christian Horner’s pre-season comments suggested Tsunoda is done at the junior Racing Bulls team after F1 2025 regardless, and Honda has recently distanced itself from supporting the Japanese driver’s F1 career, so if he too sinks against Verstappen, well, the signs suggest Red Bull were planning to release him anyway.

If he swims, then problem solved.

Tsunoda raised his game to a new level last season and has gone up another notch at the start of F1 2025, his fifth season in F1 with the Red Bull junior squad.

Calling Tsunoda up, and putting Lawson back at Racing Bulls alongside an impressive Isack Hadjar, is the way to go for me.

Michelle Foster

All this talk of dropping Liam Lawson, and not just from Red Bull but F1 altogether, after just two races with Red Bull gives new meaning to premature.

I understand Red Bull, and Red Bull’s critics and fans, are still reeling from last year’s protracted farewell to Sergio Perez, but two races! Really?

There’s no hiding that Lawson has had a woeful start to his Red Bull career with Q1 exits and not even a single point, he hasn’t even knocked on that door.

But I repeat, two races!

And they both come with mitigating arguments Your Honour [Mr Marko]. Lawson had never completed a lap of the Albert Park circuit, covered only two laps in FP3 due to a pneumatic issue with his Red Bull RB21, and then had to race the RB21 in the rain.

Moving onto China, there too he had never done a lap, had just one practice session in an RB21 that has a very small setup window, and then moved into the Sprint part of the weekend.

Yes, he has a failing grade and everyone including the driver expected more from him. But it’s been two races, two whoooooole races. Lawson deserves more of a chance, and a chance at tracks that he knows such as the next one on the calendar, Suzuka.

If he tanks in Japan, Bahrain and Jeddah, circuits he knows, then and only then can Red Bull sound the alarm bells.

Although, and it’s just a suggestion, perhaps Red Bull should spend their budget cap money on widening that setup window rather than buying alarm bells.

Oliver Harden

It is somewhere between outrageous and absurd that this debate is even taking place after two races of the new season.

As explained in PF1’s conclusions from the Chinese Grand Prix, a combination of factors – from Lawson’s own inexperience and Red Bull’s current competitive state to Verstappen’s brilliance – meant that a poor start to the new season was not entirely unexpected.

To abandon Lawson after two races, having spent all winter talking up how his resilience would help him deal with the inevitable Verstappen onslaught, would be the most appalling driver decision in Red Bull’s entire history.

The uncomfortable truth?

Anyone they choose – Tsunoda, Hadjar, another Perez-style external option – would almost certainly suffer the same fate at the hands of Verstappen.

That said, it does seem that the stars are finally starting to align for Tsunoda.

With Red Bull’s relationship with Honda nearing its conclusion, there would be a suck-it-and-see element to finally giving in to his persistent pleas for a chance alongside Verstappen.

If it works? Great.

If it doesn’t and all his progress over the last few years is undone within a few races?

Well, Red Bull always suspected he wasn’t quite suitable for it anyway, but at least neither party will be looking back in anger that they never tried it.

But surely, surely this conversation cannot take place until the summer break at the earliest.

Sam Cooper

My advice to Red Bull – chill the hell out.

It’s been two races! I am amazed there is much talk about sacking a driver so soon.

Red Bull used to be praised for the calculated way they raised their junior drivers but since Gasly, they have been burning through them so quickly that the idea of putting a 20-year-old who has done two races in the car is being discussed.

My advice would be to take a breath and give Lawson until the summer break at least. If he continues to qualify P20, sure you can make a change, but what if he is the answer to all the problems and you send him packing before he can reach his peak?

I think the 2025 Constructors’ title is only heading one way so give Lawson time and he will be in a much better position next year when the new regulations come in.

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Thomas Maher

There’s an anecdote that’s frequently told by managerial types on platforms like LinkedIn, in which they’ll explain that the promising employee they had just hired made a huge mistake that cost the business thousands/millions.

But, rather than firing the employee for that mistake, which is shutting the door after the horse has bolted, sticking with the employee pays off – the mistake isn’t one they’ll make again, with the financial punishment on the business merely being the price of that employee’s training.

That’s where Red Bull is with Liam Lawson at present and, if I was in Christian Horner’s shoes right now, I’d be sticking with Liam Lawson with the medium-to-long-term future in mind, rather than a reactive short-term desire to immediately try again with another candidate.

Plenty of time was given to an underperforming Sergio Perez and, with Lawson hinting at plenty of potential, giving him time to show what he can do in his quest to adjust to the car and team is imperative.

While the temptation to find an immediate performer for the short-term is understandable, a longer-term view needs to be taken and, if Red Bull has confidence in his talent, then giving him the reassurance and time to get to grips with it all might be beneficial.

If the worry is that Lawson could be destroyed by the mental barrage he’s currently under, then stepping him back to Racing Bulls is a justifiable position, but it does little to help Red Bull with the ongoing issue that finding someone for the second seat has been.

Contrast the approach with that taken by Mercedes towards Kimi Antonelli, a driver who, the first time he drove a contemporary F1 car during a Grand Prix weekend, binned it straight into the wall five minutes in. The assurance he has that he can make mistakes without feeling like the axe could fall at any minute means he can tackle this season with a clear mind – an approach that is already paying off.

For Lawson, all he has to do is look at how his predecessors in the second Red Bull seat have crumbled alongside Verstappen and, without the benefit of a reputation like Perez had, can see the writing on the wall.