Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda at odds over blame for Italian GP clash

Yuki Tsunoda was left far from impressed with Liam Lawson after they collided during the Italian Grand Prix.

Tsunoda understands that he and Lawson are “enemies” even if their teams are both owned by Red Bull, but said Lawson crossed a line that should not be crossed at Monza. For Lawson, he thought it was no big deal, but suggested he had not been given enough space by Tsunoda.

Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda collide at Monza

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Lawson had taken the outside line as he battled Tsunoda into the second chicane. The result was contact, as Lawson’s left front tangled with Tsunoda’s rear right, sending them both into the run-off.

“What is he doing?” Tsunoda vented over team radio.

Tsunoda ultimately finished thirteenth, one place up the road from Lawson, who he claimed had inflicted race-altering damage on his Red Bull.

Tsunoda replaced Lawson in the main Red Bull team after two rounds of the season, as Lawson returned to Racing Bulls. Tsunoda has struggled to impress since the promotion, which has presented a potential opening for Lawson and Racing Bulls team-mate Isack Hadjar to land a Red Bull F1 2026 drive.

“I got distracted by Lawson who made contact, and that was quite big enough to pick up damage, and that was big enough to slow me down quite a lot,” Tsunoda told PlanetF1.com and other media outlets.

“So very frustrating and very unnecessary from him.

“I was gaining at one second per lap. He started last, and he was not even fighting for points. If he was fighting for points, there’s some room that I can understand, because even with the sister team, we are enemies, and especially this position where I’m sitting now, is probably not most high competition, out of any world.

“But, at the same time, there’s a line that you can’t cross it, and I mean, what’s the point? I was fighting for points and he wasn’t.”

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It was only last weekend that Lawson found himself in Carlos Sainz’s bad books, the pair having collided early in the Dutch Grand Prix. That triggered a 10-second penalty for Sainz, who was left furious, with Williams submitting a right of review request.

As for this coming together with Tsunoda, Lawson was keen to brush it off.

“Nothing really to it, honestly,” he insisted.

“He passed me into Turn 1, I tried to pass him back into Turn 4, and I had no room on the right hand side, so we touched, went through the chicane, and then I gave the place back.”

Despite his promotion to the main Red Bull team, Tsunoda sits 19th in the Drivers’ Championship, four positions and eight points behind Lawson.

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