Since making the decision to replace Liam Lawson with Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull have scrambled to try and control the narrative. For obvious reasons, the Austrian team’s driver management is being called into question.
The situation at Red Bull is so polarised that, for large sections of F1 fans., Tsunoda joining the main team is seen as potentially detrimental to his career.
In this climate, Helmut Marko has delivered a series of statements to rationalise the team’s latest changes.
Amongst the 81-year-old’s comments, his latest quotes on Adrian Newey are perhaps the most unusual from this saga.
Red Bull fail to justify management of Tsunoda and Lawson
When Lawson returned to VCARB last year, the narrative was that he would compete with Tsunoda to replace Sergio Perez.
However, it became clear very soon that Lawson was Red Bull’s preferred option – even before completing a session in 2024.
Christian Horner’s statements after the Singapore GP consistently mentioned the Kiwi driver, rather than Tsunoda, as the driver of interest at Milton Keynes.
Because of this, it would have taken a significant discrepancy between the VCARB drivers to warrant a change in plans.
Therefore, the decision to promote Lawson was not necessarily a surprise – and was made irrespective of the strong performances Tsunoda had been stringing together since 2022.
Of course, Red Bull’s adamance that a driver with just 11 races was their best option to partner Verstappen hasn’t aged well.
Their hasty push to promote Lawson has only increased the backlash to their driver swap after China.
Over the last week, Helmut Marko has worked hard to rationalise the latest sequence of events at Milton Keynes.
He has suggested that Tsunoda has made a “quantum leap” in performance this year.
The 81-year-old insists that 2025 has revealed new evidence of his potential and consistency as a driver.
Considering the Japanese driver’s very solid campaigns in 2023 and 2024, these comments seem like rather desperate attempts at revisionist history.
Helmut Marko claims Newey played role Tsunoda decision
However, some of Marko’s most recent comments regarding Red Bull’s driver situation are even more unusual
When asked why Tsunoda was not promoted sooner, he argued that he failed to show enough consistency last season.
Crucially though, he also added a new detail concerning Adrian Newey:
“For a long time, Yuki had the image of not performing consistently and making silly mistakes here and there,” he told Kleine Zeitung.
“That’s what happened last year in Mexico, where the decisive phase for us began.
“With Lawson, it was the exact opposite at first. He came on and delivered straight away, no matter how great the pressure was.
“In retrospect, however, it wasn’t the right decision.
“In general, however, a lot can be traced back to a single incident.
“There Tsunoda drove into Gasly’s car. And the parts of the cars damaged the underbody of Verstappen’s car, which cost him the race.
“Adrian Newey was furious at the time. From that point on, Yuki was a red rag to him.
“But now Newey is gone, and Yuki has worked hard on himself.”
A messy situation at Red Bull
Frankly, it is difficult to understand the timeline that Helmut Marko is trying to put together.
His suggestion that Mexico is where Lawson became Red Bull’s first choice, for example, is a strange admission.
Although Tsunoda spun out in qualifying, it was Lawson who had an incident with Sergio Perez – before showing the Mexican driver the middle finger on the start/finish straight.
Surely this isn’t the race where the 23-year-old proved himself a reference in terms of consistency?
His comments about Adrian Newey are also tricky to decipher – given that Newey was no longer active in Red Bull’s F1 operations by the end of season.
Newey was already committed to Aston Martin at this stage, and wasn’t present trackside with Red Bull.
In any case, more eye-catching comments from Marko – as ever – can be expected in the foreseeable future.
