Liam Lawson rejected after just two GPs
After the Sergio Perez saga dragged on for months (if not years), Liam Lawson’s time with Red Bull ended after just the second GP. In a move that will spark debate, the Milton Keynes team rejected the New Zealander without giving him time to prove his worth, instead promoting Yuki Tsunoda from Racing Bulls.
Fred Vasseur’s words
According to Frederic Vasseur, Red Bull’s change cannot be judged from the outside. Despite having every reason to criticize his rivals, the Frenchman opts for no comment: “Would I change a driver after two GPs? These are Red Bull’s affairs. You don’t know how difficult it is to judge what happens within a team. You don’t know what’s going on, what leads them to make that decision,” he told L’Équipe. “There are 12 billion reasons behind it, which only the team and the driver know. In fact, sometimes the driver himself doesn’t know them. So I prefer not to comment.”
“You might find it brutal because only two races have passed, but we don’t even have 10% of the elements to judge,” the Frenchman added. “I hate when people judge what we do, so I won’t do it to others.”
Is there perhaps a jab at those who have judged Ferrari after these first races in Fred Vasseur’s words? After the debacle in China with the double disqualification, the team principal has faced harsh criticism.
A very harsh rejection
Changing the driver alongside Max Verstappen is something Red Bull often does, even mid-season (just think of 2019), but it had never happened after just two Grands Prix. It’s as if a football coach substituted a player after 15 minutes for technical reasons—a very harsh rejection that risks poisoning the relationship with Liam Lawson and ruining his career. Now, the New Zealander must prove himself capable of bouncing back, just as Pierre Gasly and Alex Albon did.
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