Red Bull’s recent reject Liam Lawson admits their ‘high pressure’ junior program helped him improve performance
Liam Lawson commends Red Bull’s junior program for developing him into a fierce racer
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Liam Lawson (via imago)
Red Bull recently announced their line-up for 2024. Their B-team, AlphaTauri also announced their lineup, which saw Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda re-appear in their roles for 2024. Liam Lawson, despite an impressive display of speed, missed out on a seat but seems committed to Red Bull.
The youngster was spotted praising Red Bull’s junior program, specifically for its ‘high pressure’ nature. “One of the positives about being a Red Bull driver is for me, having five years in this program, it’s a high-pressure program and we’re put under pressure from day one,” said Lawson. The Kiwi added how that has taught him to expect pressure in Formula 1 “I’m now used to that, it’s been five years of that, so situations like this I’m ready for them.”
Red Bull Young Driver Programme was the first of its kind. It is revered for producing young drivers with blistering speed and a deep understanding of the sport. The Programme, however, has come under scrutiny for being quite harsh on its drivers. A young driver from the program, who has stunned audiences with his little stint in F1, applauding the high-pressure environment at the program certainly bodes well for Red Bull.
Adrian Newey explains Red Bull’s frequent driver changes, and calls Gasly and Albon ‘not quite at that level’
Adrian Newey is one of the key figures behind Red Bull winning their sixth constructors’ title this year. He is often hailed as one of the best Formula 1 designers. Newey has also worked at Williams and McLaren in his illustrious career, which has spanned over 40 years.
Whilst appearing on the Beyond The Grid podcast, The designer commented upon Red Bull’s troubles in finding a worthy teammate to Verstappen. Newey commented upon the past few teammates that Max has had and why they don’t seem to fit into the team. He said, “I think Alex [Albon] struggled to come to terms with how quick Max was, as did Pierre Gasly and others examples, so if you’re going to have two teammates where one is exceptional and the other is brilliant but not quite at that level, the other one needs to be somebody who will, at some point, accept that he certainly can’t beat Max, for instance, on pace, you’re going to have to do it in some other way.”
Newey suggests that Max Verstappen’s ideal teammate needs to understand that he’s at the team to play as the second fiddle. If this ideal teammate wants to challenge Verstappen, he’ll have to figure out a way to do it himself. These comments explain why Red Bull have been struggling to find a proper teammate to Max, as Newey’s suggested profile is quite a hard find.
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Williams breaks silence on rumors of replacing Logan Sargeant for 2024
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Himanshu Chavan
(232 Articles Published)