He needs to go but not sure Lawson is the right person to do so, he’s hardly smashed Yuki and Red Bull aren’t even considering Yuki so he’s not cleared even that benchmark.
They really shown their hand when they refused to sign Carlos, he was by far their best option this summer. They clearly don’t want a driver who can challenge Max at all, but someone better than Checo. May be it’s time for Bottas? Only half joking.
People will say I’m clowning but I think a very large part of it might be driver marketability. Sure, Yuki comes with a nice wallet but he isn’t someone you’re using to sell cars and watches and whatever other luxury goods the teams engage with.
That being said, I fully expect him to go to AMR as soon as Alonso retires.
Id agree if they weren’t looking at Lawson who is pretty anonymous outside of New Zealand, it makes more sense with Danny as he is way more marketable, even now. Yuki does have reasonable power in Japan, which is a considerably larger economy than New Zealand, something like 3rd vs 53rd.
I could see Yuki going to AM, Lawrence would assume Lance could beat him, I am not so sure as Lance is worse than anybody Yukis already faced at RB. I would suspect he’ll go to Endurance with Honda as the more likely destination.
Marketing is an interesting one because Red Bull have one financial objective: marketing for their drinks. I’ve heard it said that Perez was very good for Red Bull marketing in Latin America as he’s a popular guy, I don’t see why Tsunoda or Lawson couldn’t fit into the “Xtreme Dude-Bro” marketing role if they needed them to.
“Popular guy” doesn’t quite tell the whole story. I personally don’t get the appeal, but for whatever reason Perez is incomprehensibly popular. I think he’s like the 2nd most famous athlete in Mexico, he sells the most merch out of anyone on the whole grid and has brought a slew of sponsors to Red Bull. This is in addition to any Carlos Slim money.
It is definitely an appealing financial package.
I believe this is the reason he is still in that seat.
They don’t have anyone better who wants to play second fiddle to Max. Carlos wouldn’t do it, and for all present or past RB drivers they have enough data to know.
We can hate Checo, but they had made difficult car from which top drivers might extract potential, but midfield drivers probably not.
I don’t think only 20 millions are keeping Checo around, brand name and Cobstructor’s championship must be worth more, but only if they are 100% certain other driver will deliver.
Red Bull decided not to choose Carlos this year, rather than the other way around, this is the second time they decided against making him Max’s teammate. I think the number of people who believe Carlos would do the same or worse than Checo is one: Checo’s dad. Not even Checo would believe that right now.
Why would they not sign him? I doubt he held out for salary parity to Max, the most I would expect is a number 2 contract as Massa or Barrichello are rumored to have had when at Ferrari. Williams hardly has the big money to pay drivers…
We aren’t comparing that second driver to Max, we are comparing them to Checo, can they score significantly more points than Checo? Even when Red Bull didn’t go in the wrong direction with their car to the point even Max was publicly complaining the car was too hard to drive. The Red Bull was peerless last year and Checo was 290 points behind Max, managed 2 races ahead of Max were they both finished, and four more races one place behind Max.
I’m guessing RBR is going to throw the constructors in the bin again because you might as well focus on getting a good start in 2026 instead of being weighed down by a poor driver selection right now. They really don’t have good options for 2025 at the moment (unless they buy someone else out, which I doubt). In that light they might give Tsunoda a one year contract because he’ll probably score more points than Perez and RBR get to see if he’s willing to play ball with the team. If not they’ll just pick someone else for 2026.
There is something to be said about throwing the constructors championship this and next season as it will mean more wind tunnel time and other resources to help the transition to the new regulations in 26.
I would be extremely surprised if they give Yuki a shot, they just do not rate him at all and only recently even remembered he was even an option for that main seat. Max has been clear that he wants no drama just racing, and I suspect that they worry Yuki will be a bit combustible.
The risk they have for 26 is that Max leaves and then they have three drivers left who they do not rate. That really limits their options to get in another world class driver to replace Max, they kind of stuck trying to buy someone whose just out of contract like LeClerc, assuming the rumors aren’t true of his last contract being till 29.
The only reason I’m thinking they’re going with Yuki is because who else is there? Lawson and Colapinto look like they’re going to bomb out like Gasly did. Bottas to my knowledge has said RBR doesn’t want him. I love Ricciardo but he seemed as washed as Perez. Even if they bring Hadjar up to F1 there’s no way he goes straight into RBR. Maybe Albon is up for grabs, but would he really want to drive the RBR again knowing he won’t be confident in that car?
Yuki is far from the ideal pick, especially because he doesn’t look like he’s ready to be the number 2 driver, but the options are so limited that if they don’t pick Yuki they might as well continue with Perez.
