Lawson is relieved the next track is one he knows

Liam Lawson is looking forward to driving at a track he knows after two poor weekends on unfamiliar circuits.

However rumours are growing that Red Bull could drop him from their top team before the next round at Suzuka in Japan.

Lawson failed to score points in either of this weekend’s races at Shanghai International Circuit. He crashed out of the season-opening race at Melbourne, which also took place on a track he had never previously raced at.

Speaking after today’s race, Lawson said he was eager to get more time in the car in order to work on the problems he’s had. “I’d love to say ‘I just need more time driving the car’, but obviously we don’t really have that,” he told the official F1 channel.

“So fortunately we go to a track that I know, and it’s a track that I like. But I’ll be spending this week very heavily going into absolutely everything to try and obviously do a better job.”

Suzuka, the next venue on the calendar, is the only venue out of the first 14 rounds on the 2025 F1 calendar where Lawson has previously started a grand prix. He also knows the track well from his stint in Japan’s Super Formula series two years ago and took pole position on his last visit.

Lawson started today’s race from the pit lane in order to evaluate set-up changes to his car. However he found the RB21’s performance was worse for him than it had been the day before.

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“To be honest we were even more competitive in yesterday’s sprint,” he said. “We were able to overtake cars and move forward.

Lawson beat team mate Tsunoda at Suzuka in 2023

“We tried something with set-up to learn something today. It was quite a big step and unfortunately it just didn’t work.

“There’s a lot to learn from this weekend, a lot for me personally to get on top of as well. It’s just been extremely tough.”

Before the season began, Lawson predicted he would have a “very, very tough” start due to his lack of experience on many of the first tracks F1 is visiting this year. After Suzuka, he knows several tracks from Formula 2, but Miami and Montreal are also venues Lawson hasn’t driven at before.

Red Bull motorsport consultant Helmut Marko said Lawson’s performance was “not what we expected.”

“We’ll analyse it carefully,” he told Sky on Saturday. “We have a few who are coming up and thankfully we’re well positioned.”

If Lawson does lose his Red Bull seat, the team is expected to promote Yuki Tsunoda, who they passed over for the drive when they sought a replacement for Sergio Perez at the end of last season.

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