Red Bull ‘rookie’ Liam Lawson will begin the 2025 Australian Grand Prix from 18th on the grid after being eliminated in the first segment of qualifying. Yuki Tsunoda – the man now parked in the Racing Bulls sister squad after being passed over for promotion in favour of Lawson – made it all the way to Q3 and will start fifth.
On the face of it, then, Red Bull’s grandees have chosen poorly.
Sergio Perez’s increasingly wayward performances in the RB20 last season made it a matter of when, rather than if, he would be fired. And as it panned out, the timeline of that decision-making process proved further evidence of the power struggle rampaging behind the scenes at Red Bull Racing: ‘driver advisor’ Helmut Marko wanted Perez out after the Spanish Grand Prix (where Perez carried a three-place grid penalty into the weekend, then was six tenths off Max Verstappen in Q3 anyway), while team principal Christian Horner argued in favour of giving him more time and won that argument.
The muddle continued until the final rounds of the year, where Tsunoda was kept waiting on confirmation that he would drive the RB20 in the post-season test in Abu Dhabi. And yet even as he was settling himself into the cockpit on that December day, the decision had pretty much been taken that Lawson would get the nod instead, on account of his “mental strength”. Ultimately, despite outpacing several team-mates, Tsunoda’s predilection for throwing tantrums under pressure swung the decision.
And so to Saturday in Australia, and Red Bull management’s egg-on-face moment.
Or is it? To cite the events of qualifying at Albert Park as prime evidence that Marko and Horner made the wrong call would be to indulge in a classic case of inductive fallacy.
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images
Indubitably Tsunoda had a great qualifying in a car that’s proved relatively benign in terms of keeping the soft tyres alive over a flying lap (team-mate Isack Hadjar only narrowly missed Q3). Red Bull’s ‘A’ team, by contrast, has struggled to dial in the RB21: on Friday, both cars were wanting for grip and balance.
Having not raced at Albert Park before, Lawson was always likely to struggle more than Verstappen in these circumstances – particularly on a ‘green’ street circuit where track evolution is more of a factor than conventional venues.
What really killed Lawson’s chances of improving was the turbo issue which prevented him from running in FP3 and evaluating the setup changes Red Bull made overnight. He would also have gained crucial operational intelligence in terms of managing the tyres over a push lap.
The soft tyre for the Australian Grand Prix is the C5 which, like Pirelli’s other compounds, has been tweaked in anticipation of the 2025 cars generating higher aerodynamic loads. But it has proved frustratingly sensitive – the rear tyres in particular simply ‘let go’ if too much is asked of them at the beginning of the lap.
Hence Lawson’s final attempt to break out of Q1 was the proverbial dog’s dinner: it started out encouragingly enough but by the middle of the lap he was having to correct oversteer snaps, sailing past the apex of Turn 12. A final excess of commitment into Turn 15 resulted in the nose ploughing onward to the grass, forcing him to abort the lap entirely.
The question is whether Tsunoda would have done any better in the same car, in the same circumstances. And the answer to that is unknown.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing, Christian Horner, Red Bull Racing, Helmut Marko, Red Bull Racing
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
Verstappen himself expressed surprise at qualifying third. During a session with Dutch media he elucidated further, saying that before the session he thought Marko was “way too optimistic” when he said the second row might be a possibility. Max even feared he might not advance as far as Q3.
It’s also worth noting that on Verstappen’s final lap, the one where he secured third on the grid, he didn’t even set a personal best time in sector one. And the rear tyres still started to misbehave as he pushed through the third sector.
You might argue that Tsunoda would therefore have been a better bet given his greater experience, since Lawson has only contested 11 grands prix. But the sensitivity of the revised tyres has altered the landscape for everyone – there are too many unknowns to say for sure.
More data is required before we decisively clap Lawson in the stocks and pelt him with rotten fruit and veg, though the Dunning-Kruger effect dictates that some people will do it anyway.
Either way, he’s going to need every ounce of that mental toughness in the days and weeks ahead.
Read Also:
In this article
Stuart Codling
Formula 1
Yuki Tsunoda
Liam Lawson
Red Bull Racing
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
Racing Bulls team principal Laurent Mekies believes the squad’s new collaboration with ExxonMobil will help with the challenge of racing with sustainable fuel from 2026 onwards.
Already working with Red Bull, it was announced on the eve of the Australian Grand Prix that ExxonMobil will now also be fuel partner to Racing Bulls, bringing with it a trackside laboratory at every F1 grand prix this season.
So, while there will be a visible presence with Mobil, Esso and Mobil 1 branding on the Racing Bulls livery and the race suits of Yuki Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar, the new partnership will also assist the team with fuel and lubricant analysis, helping to keep within the technical regulations.
Moving forward, the partnership will become all the more important with the sweeping rule changes in F1 from next season, including a switch to 100 % sustainable fuels.
“It’s fantastic news for the team to partner with ExxonMobil,” said Mekies. “The challenge of the 2026 regulations with the 100% advance sustainable fuel is going to be a huge one, not only for Formula 1 and for motor racing, but for us as a sport as we become a leader in developing new technologies for broader mobility and society.
“Having a partner as strong as ExxonMobil will help us perform at the highest level with the power unit and its full integration into our chassis.”
Laurent Mekies, Team Principal of Visa Cash App Racing Bulls
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
ExxonMobil’s involvement in F1 stretched back throughout the series’ 75 years and the company has been partners of Red Bull since 2017 – although it will tailor its work with Racing Bulls specifically.
“Becoming the fuel partner to VCARB strengthens our dedication to pushing the limits of performance in motorsport,” Katy Howell, ExxonMobil global sponsorship manager, said.
“We have a fantastic established relationship through Oracle Red Bull Racing, and this new partnership only further extends the collaboration we will foster together on the racetrack.”
The new partnership will begin immediately, with ExxonMobil technicians on the ground in Melbourne supporting Racing Bulls for this weekend’s season-opening Australian Grand Prix.
In this article
Mark Mann-Bryans
Formula 1
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
Doesn’t Helmut Marko sometimes remind you of Morpheus from The Matrix?
He has the power to make or break the careers of young drivers. In his search for the special one, he goes through dozens of them, putting the best on the conveyor belt of the Red Bull junior program. But those who agree to come on board know that things can turn brutal.
Yuki Tsunoda finds himself in a rather tenuous situation. He’s about to start his fifth season with Red Bull’s junior team, having been overlooked in favour of Liam Lawson. There’s a good chance that it could be his last.
Christian Horner, boss of the team to which Tsunoda so desperately wants to be promoted, has already publicly questioned whether it makes sense to keep Tsunoda in the family if he doesn’t get that promotion beyond 2025. And with Red Bull’s partnership with Honda coming to an end, Tsunoda’s adventure with Red Bull may also conclude.
There aren’t many options elsewhere either, which is often the case for Marko’s drivers who never made it to the senior team.
There’s really only one potential trump card for Tsunoda to play – his own performance. It looks as though that performance in 2025 will have to be nothing short of outstanding to earn him another contract extension. But would they really get rid of a driver who is delivering?
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
And if he does deliver, could the story take a different turn – one that now feels almost like science fiction? Could it still lead to that long-awaited promotion to Red Bull? If Tsunoda is fast and consistent, if he finally proves he can perform under pressure and starts communicating on the radio with AI-like composure – and if things go wrong for Lawson in the coming months… Just imagine: Marko invites Tsunoda to his office in Graz, opens his palm and reveals two pills of different colours.
“Take the blue and you can stay in Faenza for a couple of years. Take the red one and we will put you at Red Bull – but it may be over very soon.”
“The red one,” Tsunoda laughs as Autosport presents him with this metaphorical question from a Marko-Morpheus hybrid – as we sit down for a chat in the Racing Bulls’ hospitality at pre-season testing in Bahrain.
He instantly gets serious, though, and adds: “100%, red.”
Although he’s careful not to sound too displeased about Red Bull’s decision over the winter, Tsunoda admits he was surprised. From his perspective, he’s convinced he did enough to impress his bosses – not just last season, but the year before as well.
Having played a significant role in the premature sacking of Nyck de Vries by setting a benchmark the Dutchman couldn’t match in any of the 12 Grand Prix weekends they spent as team-mates, Tsunoda went on to outperform Daniel Ricciardo too. And while it was the Australian who grabbed the headline results, like P7 in Mexico 2023 and P4 in the Miami sprint last spring, Tsunoda still had the upper hand in both their qualifying head-to-head battle and total points scored.
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
He also has every reason to feel he performed better than Lawson, though the margins weren’t that convincing. And it’s likely the fact that the New Zealander was able to run so close to Tsunoda so early that tipped the scales in his favour – assuming Tsunoda was even being considered.
Yet, it was one of the paddock’s worst-kept secrets that Red Bull was leaning heavily toward promoting Lawson long before the season had even finished – despite Tsunoda himself receiving no indications from Marko, Horner, or even his own team boss Laurent Mekies. He was informed of the final decision only shortly before the public announcement.
Read Also:
“I had, like, three calls from Helmut, Christian, and Laurent [before the announcement],” he recalls. “First was Helmut, I guess. So, yeah, I heard the final decision from them.”
He says he didn’t even try to keep them on the phone too long to hear an explanation.
“I mean, there’s no point in complaining and blah, blah, blah,” he shrugs. “I just said, ‘Yeah, I get it.’ Like, ‘Okay, good luck.’ Pretty much, that’s it. I mean, I just gotta keep doing what I’m doing, and my mindset won’t change – I still want that [Red Bull] seat at some point. But the decision they made, it’s up to them, not me.
“I didn’t ask [why], really. I think Christian mentioned that it’s not about performance. From what I heard from other people, they’re saying it’s not performance-related. It’s more like a political [decision]. I don’t know. Maybe Christian didn’t really say specifically what the reason was. I didn’t care, really. Whatever they say, I don’t know if that’s true or not, to be honest. And in the end, I’m just gonna… I just told them how I feel, how I’m still motivated for next season, and that’s it.
Yuki Tsunoda with Racing Bulls team principal Laurent Mekies
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
“And afterwards, maybe I heard a couple of things [about] the reasons, from other people. I can’t expect this to be about performance – there must be another reason behind it. It is what it is. To be honest, I kind of prepared myself, even though the situation didn’t play out the way I wanted. I was already prepared beforehand so I wouldn’t, you know, completely lose control.
“I just focus on the future, on trying to be a more complete driver in general – not to give them, or any other team, a reason to say, ‘Oh, you’re not good at this’ or ‘You’re not good at that – so we don’t take you.'”
Tsunoda is still one of just 20 Formula 1 drivers – a position many others would envy. Yet, having once again been overlooked by the senior team and being convinced the decision wasn’t based purely on performance, he must feel hard done by. But he insists his motivation hasn’t taken a hit, even if his future prospects remain uncertain.
“To be honest, I’m now – surprisingly, even for myself – mentally in quite a similar place to where I was last year coming into the new season,” he says. “Really focused on our team, what we’re currently working on, how the car works. I guess all I care about is the performance of our team, rather than other teams, [be it] Red Bull or whatever. I’m feeling good – maybe because the first race hasn’t started yet. But I’m just happy with my current position.
“I’m definitely motivated. I think this year, for sure… I’ll have a more [defined] role in terms of leadership. Last year, at the start of the season, it was a bit 50/50, probably slightly leaning towards Daniel [in terms of who was seen as the team leader]. But I was able to kind of change that image within the team throughout the season. Towards the end, I was already starting to be seen as the leader.
“This year, there’s no other experienced driver in the team, so for sure the team will rely on me more. And it feels like there’s more responsibility. So I definitely want to strengthen that image within the team – I want to help, not just in terms of extracting performance from the car, but in guiding the team’s overall direction. And [establishing] that leadership status, I would say, is the main target I have to work on this year. I want to show that to the whole paddock, not just my team.”
Yuki Tsunoda with his new team-mate Isack Hadjar
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
One way or another, if Tsunoda still holds hope of one day being promoted to Red Bull, it’s important for him to take lessons on board.
“I still don’t know why,” he admits, though. “I still don’t fully understand what caused this decision. But I would say I understand more about Formula 1 now. I mean, I understand part of the decision. But I just… don’t follow. I just stopped trying to follow the reason. The more I think about it, the more I start to get confused.
“Like I said, I think I was prepared [for it]. I was not… I wouldn’t say that I was angry. But, to be honest, I was frustrated with the situation during the season – especially around Qatar, Texas, Mexico, that time of year.
“Like, I was never really the first contender [for the seat]. It was always some other driver. You know, I just beat Daniel, and still… whoever comes in next to me, he’s the one who gets considered first – even though he hasn’t raced much [in F1] yet. So in those situations, yeah, I was definitely frustrated. And that’s why, partly, the decision doesn’t make sense at all.
“So yeah, it was quite hard to control myself on the track – not to show frustration, to stay consistent, not to… not to let it affect my emotions too much. That was the hardest part. But once the season finished, I was only thinking about how to show my performance.”
Yet, that seems to be the very reason Tsunoda was never seriously considered by Red Bull.
Tsunoda crashed during Hungarian GP qualifying
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
“The decision was mainly a question of mental strength,” Marko told Autosport in Bahrain. “Around Mexico, Yuki unfortunately had his two accidents, and at the time, Liam did very well. So we looked at all the facts.”
And Marko has a valid point. Tsunoda did, in fact, have two crashes in Mexico – one in qualifying and another at the race start – and Red Bull’s bosses were free to take that as confirmation that, despite his experience, he still tends to crack under pressure.
Whether he likes it or not – whether he understands it or not – if Tsunoda still wants that Red Bull promotion, there’s little point in dwelling on the past. He needs to look at himself as well.
Read Also:
There are signs that he is, indeed, trying to change things. He has already reshuffled his management team. Make no mistake: there was probably nothing Mario Miyakawa and Luis Alvarez could have done to convince Marko and Horner. After all, even having a heavyweight like Julian Jakobi didn’t help Sergio Perez secure his seat once Red Bull had made its decision. But perhaps Tsunoda feels he needs a fresh start.
“Formula 1, it’s not just about driving – it’s also about how you behave in the paddock and how you deal with teams in general,” he says when asked if he now understands the F1 world better.
“In my first year, I didn’t really think about those kinds of things – other than, you know, [assuming] that track performance would shape my image. But from my second, third season onwards, I started to understand and obviously work on those things – that I had to change myself or improve.
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
“Especially self-control. You know, I used to lose control quite easily in my first year. But, I mean, last year, I definitely made a huge step – I can confidently say that. And yeah, the image you have definitely affects everything else. So I’m trying to take a different approach as well [this year].”
Part of his motivation now, Tsunoda admits, is also to prove Marko and Horner wrong.
“I mean, I don’t think people in the paddock see me clearly as being a team leader, I would say – not fully 100% yet,” he says. “So I just want to create that baseline for sure. Try to be as ready as possible, and show good results. And then, we’ll see how it goes.”
He’s also confident that his test with the main Red Bull team in Abu Dhabi last year – his first-ever outing with them – left at least a few people within the organisation impressed.
“I think I did really well in Abu Dhabi, which I am quite happy about,” he says. “After that test, I was just happy with what I showed. I just felt like I did what I had to do. There aren’t many things left [for them to be convinced]. So it’s up to them. I will keep working [in order] to not give any reason anymore [for them] to not give me the seat.”
After all, trying to convince Marko that he’s the chosen one is probably Tsunoda’s only real option in F1 now.
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
“I think it kind of relates to the answers I gave you,” he smiles. “I mean, it depends on this year. But I have the confidence that I can perform in general – that’s why I took the red [pill]. Because I know that I can perform well, and I will definitely go above their expectations. And that’s what I’ve already done in the Abu Dhabi test.
“I’m sure I can be more than just a Red Bull driver for multiple years. I can be more than that. So I see [myself] as a successful driver.”
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
In this article
Oleg Karpov
Formula 1
Yuki Tsunoda
Red Bull Racing
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
For the second instalment of a new mini-series where Autosport is delving into the budding Formula 1 careers of the six 2025 rookies, today we’re introducing new Racing Bulls driver Isack Hadjar.
The 20-year-old was born in Paris and has French and Algerian heritage – bringing a new link for F1 to north Africa. Of the two African countries with major race-hosting history, the Moroccan Grand Prix back in 1958 is now nearly 70 years ago and firmly in the world championship’s infancy.
But, back in the here and now, Hadjar – who is managed by his mother and his father is a quantum physicist – was asked about his Algerian heritage during F1 pre-season testing in Bahrain.
“I represent them now, I guess,” he said. “Obviously, I race under the French flag. But, yeah, it’s a first in Formula 1. And I’m proud of that. I’ll just [try to] do them proud. That’s it.”
Hadjar arrives in F1 after finishing as runner-up in the 2024 Formula 2 championship and has been Red Bull-backed since 2022. Last year’s F2 campaign was his second at the top of the grand prix support bill, after he’d been fourth in Formula 3 in 2022.
That same year he completed a dual programme with the Formula Regional Asian championship – where he finished third – after coming fifth in the European series in 2021. His single-seater career started with two seasons in French Formula 4, with a best finish of third in 2020.
When asked by Autosport how he’d choose to introduce himself to F1 fans at the recent F175 Live event in London, Hadjar replied: “I’m someone who fought his way to F1 the hard way and I’m really excited about this challenge.
“I’m really hungry and I’ll just give my absolute maximum and try and be spectacular on track.”
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team, Isack Hadjar, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Getty Images
That approach was certainly on display during the first day of F1 pre-season testing in Bahrain last month, with Hadjar pirouetting balletically through a 360-degree spin exiting the Sakhir track’s Turn 4 early on the opening afternoon.
But that has more to do with the initial debut of the VCARB 02 – where its drivers’ early grapples with balance were matched in being as bad as its fresh livery is utterly excellent.
Hajar’s driving style involves using the brakes aggressively on corner entry, which might be an early alarm bell given Lewis Hamilton – who previously excelled with such an approach – has struggled considerably on this front with the new ground-effect generation of cars. They just don’t like being pushed so much and front locking can become unpredictable as the downforce sheds when the speed range changes suddenly on turn-in.
Off-track, Hadjar made a lower-key impact at testing. Rookie nerves are entirely natural, but, as with his comment above, he seemed to be combatting them with a delightful, determined streak. Take for instance how he insisted on the test’s final day that he “would say I got up to speed fairly quickly”.
“Just able to push the limit of the car quite well, got used to F1 [speeds],” he added. “But now the more difficult bit is to extract the most out of it when it matters. Especially on short runs, I feel like there’s still some work to do. It’s hard to get the tyres in the right window.”
This has all made for a captivating entrance, but Hadjar’s reputation is immediately entangled with an intangible element for which the F1 sphere is very guilty of often adding, even to young drivers.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing, Isack Hadjar, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
This is how narratives can become very hard to shift, especially if positive results aren’t forthcoming to knock the championship’s hive mind into a different place.
At this stage ahead of the Melbourne opener, it’s only fair, and logical, to assume Hadjar will be able to reach these – if the VCARB 02 shows better once testing fuel loads are removed and engine modes turned up to maximum. If it doesn’t, at least he can learn away from the intense focus that comes with fighting for the higher places.
For Hadjar, the already-established narratives centre on two things: how he too often delivered ear-splitting team radio messages in the lower formula and that his F2 title campaign fell apart from a strong position midway through 2024.
Surrounding all this is how his Silverstone FP1 appearance for Red Bull was underwhelming to the point it left team insiders with an apparent reluctance to promote him.
That’s until circumstances changed considerably for Sergio Perez and Franco Colapinto – in opening up a spot at Red Bull’s main team and how its management considered candidates for what is now Hadjar’s seat that included looking outside Red Bull’s junior fold.
Hadjar insists the radio flapping matters little, but it is partly for a similar infraction that Red Bull has become so entrenched in its position on his now team-mate, Yuki Tsunoda.
But all of Hadjar’s 2024 F2 wins coming in feature races do bolster his standings considerably, given they didn’t come from a reversed grid.
Isack Hadjar, Campos Racing
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
His job now is also two-fold as his rookie racing bow approaches: to shut out the speculation and succeed with Racing Bulls, while avoiding the fate of its most recent unexpected driver hire. This was Nyck de Vries, who lasted just 10 races in 2023.
Daniel Ricciardo’s re-signing and ejection last year is also a timely reminder of just how brutal the Red Bull junior scheme can be, with the energy drinks giant having another up-and-comer already rising in Arvid Lindblad. Red Bull team boss Christian Horner and its key motorsport advisor, Helmut Marko, are known to rate Lindblad highly.
Inevitably, this will pile pressure on Hadjar as Marko is incapable of avoiding this and actually prefers drivers who thrive with it.
But, if being Max Verstappen’s Red Bull team-mate is considered the hardest job in F1 – currently the fate of another Red Bull junior in Liam Lawson, who this series will consider next – then in trying to succeed amid all that pressure at Racing Bulls, Hadjar has surely stepped straight into the championship’s second most challenging task in 2025.
Read Also:
In this article
Alex Kalinauckas
Formula 1
Isack Hadjar
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
Racing Bulls technical director Jody Egginton will leave the Formula 1 squad and move to Red Bull Advanced Technologies, the team has announced.
Egginton will stay within the Red Bull family but his move to Red Bull’s technology arm means his time in F1 will come to an end after a career spanning almost 30 years.
The 51-year-old Briton has served as the Racing Bulls technical director since its Toro Rosso days in 2019. The Anglo-Italian outfit announced Egginton’s departure would be covered by staff already at the team.
Former FIA man Tim Goss, who joined last year as chief technical officer, will take on additional duties, as will his deputies Guillaume Cattelani and Andrea Landi, who head up car performance and design respectively.
“Being part of this team for over 10 years has been a fantastic experience for me, providing some very memorable moments,” said Egginton.
“But after almost 20 years of focusing solely on Formula 1, I feel it’s time for a change. I will have a great remit as Engineering Director of Red Bull Advanced Technologies and the company currently has an exciting list of projects, so I can’t wait to get started on this new challenge.”
Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
Racing Bulls boss Laurent Mekies paid tribute to Egginton, who first joined Toro Rosso in 2014 after stints at Tyrell, various guises of Force India and Lotus.
“As our long-serving technical director, he has been instrumental in driving innovation and fostering team growth,” he said. “I want to thank Jody for his expertise and the important contribution he has made to the team and the company’s upward trajectory. We wish him all the best for this new challenge within the Red Bull family.”
Egginton leaves a legacy of efficiency and success at Faenza
When James Key relinquished his role as technical director at the team then known as Toro Rosso after agreeing to join McLaren at the start of 2019, Egginton stepped up to the task with his own ideas of how to improve the team’s efficiency.
Toro Rosso had always been birthed with the idea of being Red Bull’s junior operation, but the outlawing of customer cars and subsequent differences in powertrain partners required the Faenza squad to produce its own parts. Suspension packages and gearboxes, for example, needed to be slightly different – and Key’s leadership moved the team towards its own autonomy in the design department.
It was generally successful for a time but, when Red Bull joined Toro Rosso in taking Honda power in 2019, Egginton felt that there was limited value in having resource spent on developing its own kit. Elsewhere on the grid, Haas had shown the value of building a car around common parts shared with Ferrari – why was Toro Rosso doing its own thing when Red Bull Technology was already developing “non-listed” parts that could be shared between teams?
Thus, the Coventry-born engineer figured that the team could simply buy in the components produced at RBT and reallocate personnel and finance to other areas of the car. Immediate success followed as Toro Rosso achieved its highest constructors’ placing in 2019 with sixth, and the follow-up AlphaTauri AT01 as the team rebranded itself claimed Faenza’s second F1 win – its first for 12 years – at Monza. It then finished sixth again in 2021.
Pierre Gasly, AlphaTauri AT01, 1st position, takes victory to the delight of his team
Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images
Although the team has not enjoyed as much success after the re-introduction of ground effect aerodynamics, Egginton’s changes have at least ensured that the team had a championship-winning basis to work from in taking parts from Red Bull. A decision to stray from his MO and produce its own front suspension components for the first two years of the 2022-spec regulations was reversed, and this helped put RB into the fight for sixth in last year’s championship.
He might not be one of the most well-known names in the F1 paddock, but Egginton played a significant part in ensuring one of the smallest teams on the grid could punch well above its weight.
Read Also:
In this article
Filip Cleeren
Formula 1
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
While Racing Bulls – and its previous monikers – has shared common technology with its ‘parent’ Red Bull squad throughout its 19-year tenure in Formula 1, the team is a bona fide constructor in its own right.
The Italian-registered squad leans on Red Bull for gearboxes, suspension, and other tradeable components to ensure its own operations do not swell unnecessarily, but it has also been improving its own infrastructure to ensure that it can remain competitive.
Having come to the conclusion that its old Bicester facilities were far too small, Racing Bulls invested in a new UK department based in Milton Keynes – effectively across the road from Red Bull’s campus.
This has allowed it to spread its workforce across two bases, taking the decision not to pigeon-hole certain departments into a chosen facility.
Team principal Laurent Mekies, in an interview with Autosport’s sister publication Motorsport.com Italy, says that the decision not to “localise” each department ensures that communication between the two sites has been enhanced, and also allows the staff freedom of choice to choose whether to base themselves in the UK or Italy.
“It’s a complex process,” Mekies said. “If you ask me today whether having two locations is an advantage, I’d say no, it’s not – because in this business, everything relies on people and communication between them, and that’s difficult to manage.
“We made a crucial decision not to localise departments in just one of the two sites, whether it’s aero, design, or production. Instead, we chose a model where each of these departments has staff both in Faenza and Milton Keynes.
“We call this model ‘Location Free’, and we adopted it for one reason: the ability to recruit people in both England and Italy.
“We have this opportunity, so to maximise it, we expanded it to all departments. This way, we can offer employees the choice to work in Italy or the UK, which is also useful in retaining staff when life choices come into play.”
Laurent Mekies, Team Principal of Visa Cash App Racing Bulls
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
Mekies also explained that, while Racing Bulls’ continued acceptance of Red Bull-designed components ensured the team did not have to invest heavily in expanding its workforce or in research and development, there are a handful of disadvantages to doing so.
He noted that, given the team’s lack of involvement in the design processes for those components, “you don’t fully grasp the reasoning behind certain design choices, which can be a challenge when we are fighting for every tenth of a second”.
After all, those parts are designed for Red Bull to fit into its own aerodynamic philosophy; for Racing Bulls, it must develop its own car with those limitations.
“From Red Bull’s perspective, it makes sense that with two teams in Formula 1, they share the few components allowed by the regulations rather than hiring an extra hundred people to duplicate work already being done elsewhere,” Mekies added.
Regardless, everything else at Racing Bulls’ two bases is indicative of a fully fledged constructor, rather than of a ‘junior team’ receiving little more than cast-offs from its bigger brother.
Despite its links to Red Bull, Racing Bulls – Mekies argued – effectively operates as an independent team, rather than one linked with a manufacturer in the automotive industry.
The team was, for a season, Honda’s works entity before Red Bull took that over in 2019. When Ford makes its return to F1 as a partner to Red Bull Powertrains, it will work with the lead Red Bull team on defining concepts – and Racing Bulls will, effectively, get what it’s given.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing, Isack Hadjar, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
“Our facilities house engineers working on simulation, vehicle mechanics, carbon fibre, aerodynamics, car dynamics – it’s the definition of a constructor,” Mekies said.
“I’d also add that, apart from us and Williams, every other team is connected in some way to an automotive manufacturer. This makes our journey even more fascinating because we are competing against giants.
“The goal is to evolve our team into a model that can be competitive in the future.
“We’ve seen that the midfield has made big steps forward, so we need to invest in people, processes, and infrastructure. We have invested in our new facility in Milton Keynes as well as in Faenza, and we’ve grown a lot.
“But, while we work on this, we also have a grand prix to tackle every two weeks, so we need to manage our energy wisely.”
Read Also:
In this article
Jake Boxall-Legge
Formula 1
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
If Yuki Tsunoda and his new management were hoping to receive a helping hand from Honda as Tsunoda builds a case to remain in Formula 1, the mood music coming from HQ isn’t promising.
As a member of Honda’s driver programme, Tsunoda was fast-tracked through the European junior single-seater ladder, making his F1 debut in 2021 with the team then known as AlphaTauri. At the time it was politically expedient for Red Bull to take a Honda-supported driver since it was trying to keep the manufacturer engaged in F1 after an expensive spend to reach competitiveness – and much bad PR during its abortive comeback with McLaren.
But now the landscape has shifted: Honda is realigning itself with Aston Martin, Red Bull is pivoting back towards building its own engines, albeit with Ford sponsorship, and Tsunoda is entering his fifth season in F1 having failed to convince Red Bull he is worth promoting to partner Max Verstappen in its senior team. And the message to him from Honda is: you’re on your own.
“He [Tsunoda] needs to take action himself,” Honda Racing Corporation president Koji Watanabe said in an interview with Japanese Motorsport.com. “I want him to make the best choices for himself.
“He’s now in his fifth year, has the ability, and understands the world of F1 well.
“There’s not much more we can do for him. He needs to solidify his support team, including his manager, and secure the necessary seat. He is a professional, after all.
“Drivers can’t rely on Honda forever. Someone of Tsunoda’s career level needs to think for himself.”
Watanabe (right) has made it clear that Tsunoda is on his own
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
If this doesn’t sound unequivocal enough, Watanabe had already made Honda’s point clear in an earlier press conference: “Tsunoda has a sponsorship agreement with us. He is fundamentally an independent driver, but we support him as a sponsor.”
The end of Honda’s relationship with Red Bull has triggered an extensive pulling-up of the ladders, since Ayumu Iwasa – currently the Racing Bulls F1 reserve driver after bouncing between F2 and Super Formula in recent years – has also been told he needs to manage his own future.
“In theory, there could be opportunities with Aston Martin, but Iwasa is free to make his own career decisions,” clarified Watanabe.
The implication here is that Honda is presuming nothing as it approaches this new relationship, and it certainly doesn’t want to begin its new arrangement with Aston Martin while laden with baggage from the Red Bull years.
Takuma Sato, the Indy 500 winner who entered F1 in 2002 with Honda’s support and is now an HRC executive, said as much recently.
“Yuki has nothing to do with Honda anymore,” he said. “I want him to go to Red Bull, Mercedes, or Ferrari as soon as possible. If he doesn’t move on, it blocks the path for younger drivers.
“He has made it this far, so there’s no need for Honda or HRC to step in and negotiate for him anymore.”
Not that there are any immediate vacancies at Aston Martin anyway, since Fernando Alonso is contracted until the end of 2026, Lance Stroll will occupy the other seat for as long as his father owns the team, and the reserve driver role is the domain of 2022 F2 champion Felipe Drugovich. The only opportunity that might open up – ‘in theory’ – is if Drugovich parlays his IMSA relationship with Cadillac into an F1 drive when that manufacturer joins F1 next year. But that’s also a destination Tsunoda will have in mind.
Aside from that, there are no seats at F1’s top table unless Liam Lawson fails spectacularly at Red Bull. The midfield is also well catered for: Williams, Sauber/Audi and Haas have no reason to change their existing line-ups and Alpine already has Franco Colapinto ready to replace Jack Doohan if the need arises.
Is a sixth season at Racing Bulls now Tsunoda’s most realistic prospect apart from Cadillac? Perhaps – but, since Red Bull’s junior programme is stuttering into gear again after being caught short recently, there’s no guarantee of him continuing there either.
Red Bull ‘driver advisor’ Helmut Marko told our Dutch Motorsport.com colleagues Tsunoda’s new team-mate Isack Hadjar had done enough already to make the senior stakeholders “happy”. Meanwhile, the highly rated Arvid Lindblad will make his F2 debut this year and could easily be in the hunt for a 2026 seat.
“He [Tsunoda] has a young, fast team-mate next to him and it’s his own future, you know, so he has to motivate himself,” said Marko.
“If he is doing well, then there is a future. If not, then maybe there’s no more chance in F1 for him.”
Additional reporting by Kenichi Tanaka, Kan Namekawa and Ronald Vording
In this article
Stuart Codling
Formula 1
Yuki Tsunoda
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
Yuki Tsunoda reshuffled his management team amid losing out on a Red Bull promotion to Liam Lawson for the 2025 Formula 1 campaign.
The Racing Bulls driver was previously managed by Mario Miyakawa and Luis Alvarez, before parting ways with both shortly after the 2024 season ended in December.
Tsunoda is now being managed by Mexican Diego Menchaca, who contested European single-seaters until 2018 before switching to sportscars.
He has competed in the International GT Open for the past two years having finished runner-up in 2023, but from 2025 he will focus entirely on driver management as he also works with F3’s Noah Stromsted.
“I am not working [with] Mario anymore, and Luis as well,” Tsunoda confirmed to Autosport. “I’m really happy with Diego.
“He’s motivated, definitely. Once we decided to work together, he immediately went to Helmut’s [Marko, Red Bull advisor] office to build a relationship. That kind of effort, I really appreciate – and obviously, Helmut did too.
Christian Horner, Team Principal of Oracle Red Bull Racing, Liam Lawson, Red Bull Racing RB21
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
“They already have a good relationship, which is a good start. But in the end, the most important thing is to perform on track, which will make Diego’s life easier.”
The 2025 F1 season will be Tsunoda’s fifth in the series, all coming with Red Bull’s sister squad which has raced under the AlphaTauri, RB and now Racing Bulls guises since the 24-year-old’s debut.
Red Bull has never seriously considered Tsunoda for a promotion to its main squad, despite outperforming his past three team-mates in Nyck de Vries, Daniel Ricciardo and Lawson.
The decision to promote Lawson for 2025 sparked mixed reactions in the paddock, but the 23-year-old was long tipped to replace Sergio Perez as Max Verstappen’s team-mate even before the Mexican’s departure was officially confirmed.
So Tsunoda will now partner rookie Isack Hadjar at Racing Bulls and he will start the campaign as the Italian outfit’s clear number one driver after finishing a career-best of 12th in the 2024 standings.
“Yuki last year did a step I think none of us was expecting,” said Racing Bulls team boss Laurent Mekies during 2025 pre-season testing in Bahrain.
Isack Hadjar and Yuki Tsunoda, RB F1 Team
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
“[He] did a big step forward in terms of speed, in terms of maturity, in terms of technical feedback – and I think if there is another step like that in Yuki this year, it’s going to be really, really interesting!
“So in terms of what would a good year look like for him, it’s to see another step of the same magnitude of what we’ve seen last year.”
Tsunoda’s future beyond 2025, however, remains uncertain. Speaking to the media shortly after Lawson’s promotion was announced, Horner questioned whether it “makes sense” to keep Tsunoda in the Red Bull family if he is not in contention for a senior team seat this year.
If Red Bull releases him at the end of the season, Tsunoda’s options appear limited. He was in talks with Haas last year and was also being considered by Sauber, but Red Bull opted to extend his contract for another season.
Since then, both teams have locked in their driver line-ups for the next few years, leaving Tsunoda with few obvious alternatives should he find himself out of a seat for 2026.
Read Also:
In this article
Oleg Karpov
Formula 1
Yuki Tsunoda
Red Bull Racing
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
A race engineer has one of the most important roles in any Formula 1 team. It is their job to optimise the performance of the driver-and-car combination. Throughout the race weekend, they translate the feedback coming from the driver into set-up decisions to achieve the best possible result. And, except in rare cases, they are the only ones who communicate directly with drivers via team radio.
Here’s who F1 drivers will be working with in 2025.
Norris will continue to work with Will Joseph, who has been part of the Briton’s crew since his F1 debut in 2019. The pair already have a good working relationship, which should help Norris in this year’s campaign. In 2023, McLaren experimented with alternating engineers on Norris’ side of the garage, with Jose Manuel Lopez taking on the role for some races, but ultimately Joseph remained as the English racer’s sole race engineer.
Lando Norris and Will Joseph
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
Tom Stallard, who won a silver medal in rowing for Team GB at the 2008 Olympic Games, has been with McLaren for almost two decades. As a race engineer, he has worked with Jenson Button, Stoffel Vandoorne, Carlos Sainz and Daniel Ricciardo. He has partnered with Piastri since the Australian’s F1 debut two years ago and will continue in the same role in 2025.
Oscar Piastri with Tom Stallard
Photo by: Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images
Hamilton will be working with one of the most experienced race engineers in F1. Riccardo Adami joined Ferrari from Toro Rosso in 2015 and has since worked with Sebastian Vettel and Sainz. This will be Hamilton’s first change of race engineer in more than a decade, as Peter Bonnington has decided to stay at Mercedes.
Riccardo Adami, Ferrari
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
In May 2024, Bryan Bozzi replaced Xavi Marcos as Leclerc’s race engineer. While Marcos’ infamous “We are checking” replies became the source of memes about Ferrari’s alleged incompetence in race strategy, Bozzi sounds much more confident and even a little stern with Leclerc – and the Monegasque has already secured three victories alongside the Italian-Danish engineer. Bozzi joined Ferrari in 2012 and has worked in Leclerc’s crew since the driver joined the team in 2019. He was previously his performance engineer.
Bryan Bozzi, Scuderia Ferrari
Photo by: Ferrari
The Jason Statham of F1 will continue to guide Verstappen despite his promotion within Red Bull. It’s hard to imagine another engineer handling the Dutchman’s temperament as effectively. Gianpiero Lambiase started in F1 when Verstappen was still in primary school, working with Paul Di Resta and Sergio Perez at Force India. He was initially hired by Red Bull to replace Guillaume Rocquelin as Vettel’s engineer, but when the German left for Ferrari, Lambiase ended up working with Daniil Kvyat. After Kvyat was demoted to Toro Rosso in mid-2016, Lambiase was paired with then-18-year-old Verstappen. They’ve been inseparable since.
Gianpiero Lambiase, Red Bull Racing
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
The second Red Bull car is entrusted to Richard Wood, who, like incoming driver Lawson, is relatively new to the role. Woody, as he’s known in the team, has been with Red Bull for more than a decade, rising through the ranks before joining Perez’s side of the garage as a performance engineer four years ago. Last year he had his first stint as race engineer, replacing Hugh Bird, who missed several races through paternity leave. Christian Horner cited this as a key factor in Wood’s “natural” promotion, with Bird now concentrating on factory work in order to spend more time with his family.
Richard Wood with Sergio Perez
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
Mercedes
It’s hard to imagine a better coach for the Mercedes youngster at the start of his F1 career. Peter Bonnington’s last two drivers are the most successful in F1 history. Bono joined the Brackley-based team in the Honda era, won the 2009 championship as Jenson Button’s performance engineer when the outfit was Brawn GP, and then retained the role for Michael Schumacher when it became Mercedes. He went on to take over as Hamilton’s race engineer in 2013, and together they broke many records. As well as keeping Antonelli’s tyres in good shape, Bono – now head of race engineering – will oversee both sides of the garage.
Lewis Hamilton with Peter Bonnington
Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images
The lead Mercedes driver will continue to work with Marcus Dudley, who has been Russell’s race engineer since 2023. Since then, he has not only helped the Briton learn the difference between sweat and rain but has also guided him to a couple of grand prix victories. Dudley has been with Mercedes for more than a decade, having started his F1 career in 2006.
Marcus Dudley, Mercedes-AMG F1 Team
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
Aston Martin
Alonso’s previous engineer, Chris Cronin, who also worked with Vettel and Perez, has been promoted within the team. Alonso will now work with Andrew Vizard, who has moved from Lance Stroll’s side of the garage. Vizard began working with Stroll at the 2024 Japanese Grand Prix and has now been assigned to Alonso. He joined Aston Martin at the start of 2023 after five years with Williams.
Andrew Vizard with Lance Stroll
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
The American engineer started his F1 career with Marussia and spent the last decade with Haas. Gary Gannon was the race engineer for Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen before working with German drivers Mick Schumacher and Nico Hulkenberg. He built a strong reputation at Haas, and his move to Aston Martin is a logical career progression.
Gary Gannon worked with Nico Hulkenberg for the last two years at Haas
Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images
This is John Howard’s second season as Gasly’s race engineer after the team promoted the Frenchman’s previous engineer, Karel Loos, to deputy head of track engineering. Howard has been with Alpine for 13 years, starting as a mechanical design engineer and working his way up through other roles, including engineering coordinator and senior performance engineer.
John Howard, Alpine race engineer
Photo by: Alpine
For the past few years, Josh Peckett has been Esteban Ocon’s race engineer, famously guiding him to victory in the 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix. The pair reunited at Alpine, having both worked at Manor in 2016 when the Frenchman made his F1 debut – although Peckett was on a different side of the garage at the time. Now their paths have parted again, with Ocon moving to Haas and Peckett remaining at Alpine, where he’ll work with Jack Doohan.
Jack Doohan with Josh Peckett
Photo by: Alpine
Haas
Ocon’s race engineer will be under the spotlight this year as Laura Mueller is the first woman to hold such a position in F1. The 33-year-old German joined Haas in 2022 after a career in sportscars, DTM and GT. She has been a performance engineer for the past two years and will now help Ocon settle in at Haas.
Laura Müller and Esteban Ocon
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
Haas changed both race engineers over the winter. Gary Gannon and Mark Slade left the team to make way for Mueller and Ronan O’Hare. The latter will now work with Bearman. The Irish engineer has a wealth of experience, not only in F1 but also in other categories, including Formula E. In F1, before Haas, he worked for Williams and also spent a few years at Brackley.
Oliver Bearman with Ronan O’Hare
Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images
Ernesto Desiderio is Tsunoda’s second race engineer in F1. The Japanese started his career with Mattia Spini, but the latter was promoted within the team in the middle of last year, so Yuki has been working with Desiderio since the Monza race. Ernesto joined the team in 2023 from Williams. He previously worked at Haas.
Yuki Tsunoda with race engineer Ernesto Desiderio
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
The French rookie will work alongside compatriot Pierre Hamelin, who has been one of the Faenza-based team’s race engineers since 2016. He was promoted to the role ahead of that year’s Spanish Grand Prix and has since worked with a number of drivers including Kvyat, Brendon Hartley, Gasly, Nyck de Vries, Daniel Ricciardo and most recently Lawson.
Pierre Hamelin has been working with several drivers, including Daniel Ricciardo
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
Williams
Having started his career as a mechanic in the European Le Mans Series and British Touring Car Championship, James Urwin joined Williams in 2014 and has since worked as a race engineer for Stroll and Russell. The coming season will be his fourth with Albon.
Alex Albon, Williams Racing, with his engineer James Urwin on the grid
Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images
Gaetan Jego joined Williams in 2020, having previously spent more than a decade with the ART Grand Prix team. He moved to F1 from the role of LMP1 technical director when the outfit supported SMP Racing in sportscars, working with Nicholas Latifi, Logan Sargeant and Franco Colapinto at the end of last year. Now he’s tasked with helping four-time race winner Sainz.
Gaetan Jego, Williams Racing Race Engineer
Photo by: Williams
Steven Petrik joined Sauber last year from Ferrari. He spent eight years in Maranello as a performance engineer, most recently on Sainz’s side of the garage. After moving to Sauber, he replaced Valtteri Bottas’ engineer Alex Chan and stayed in that role until the end of the season.
Steven Petrik
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
Jose Manuel Lopez joined Sauber from McLaren over the winter. For the majority of his time at Woking, which began in 2020, he was Norris’ performance engineer, and on a number of occasions in 2023 he even acted as his race engineer, deputising for Will Joseph, particularly while the Briton was on paternity leave.
Last year, however, he moved to McLaren’s driver development department and it was in this role that he had the opportunity to oversee Bortoleto’s performance in Formula 2 – so although the Brazilian is a rookie in F1, he’s already had experience of working with his new race engineer. Prior to McLaren, Lopez spent several years at Haas, where he was one of the team’s first employees.
Jose Manuel Lopez with Lando Norris
Photo by: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images
In this article
Oleg Karpov
Formula 1
Ferrari
Red Bull Racing
RB
McLaren
Williams
Sauber
Aston Martin Racing
Mercedes
Haas F1 Team
Alpine
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
Racing Bulls has, quite rightly, garnered plaudits for its switch to a white livery for 2025, producing a new(ish) twist to the formula of Red Bull influenced liveries as its ‘sister’ team completes a decade with the same design. White cars haven’t always been popular, particularly in the mid-2000s when it felt like every manufacturer team had one, but the VCARB 02’s matte tones just feel right.
We’ve now seen the team’s second car since its rebrand from AlphaTauri hit the road and, although it definitely ticks all the boxes usually indicative of “evolutionary design”, there are a few key changes and upgrades that set it apart from its predecessor.
The suspension at the front appears to have largely the same geometry, retaining the pull-rod formula and low-mounted rear leg of the upper wishbone, which also hints towards Red Bull’s direction for 2025 as the two teams share suspension layouts. Racing Bulls had also hidden the outer mounting point of its pull-rod behind the brake ducts last year, but a new duct assembly appears to clear a path around the pull-rod instead.
In line with what has become fashionable, Racing Bulls has also adopted the overbite sidepod inlets to follow the other teams that gravitated towards the design popularised by Red Bull and McLaren. The inlet shape became clear by enhancing the brightness of the image, which has been marked on our annotated images of the car, and visibly follows the P-shape by opening up a vertical inlet along the chassis flanks.
Visually, the VCARB 02 does not look completely distinct from the car that preceded it around the engine cover, as it retains the high-shouldered outlets that help to grow the channels along the top of the sidepods – which appear to have become broader as the team has put greater attention on keeping the flow controlled energised in this part of the car.
The square rollhoop inlet remains, as does the general rear wing geometry and the push-rod rear suspension; the team is keeping a platform that it knows and feels it can refine before the attention switches to 2026. There are also a number of subtle changes to the front wing, which we thought we’d explore in a little more detail.
RB opted for an angular, pointy nose last season, and a front wing with a slightly raised section where it met the nose to drive more airflow underneath the car. Now known as Racing Bulls, the new nose droops down a little more to, this time, lower the central wing section and perhaps use the wing to trim any stagnating flow here. As such, the nose’s top surface has been smoothed out and the wing elements joined to it reorganised with a longer-chord second element. The top two elements in turn have had their chord lengths reduced.
Details of the new Racing Bulls front nose and wing
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
There are all-new endplates, with a switch to a curved leading edge, S-shaped diveplane, and revised junction points to the front wing elements to redefine the direction that the airflow takes around the rest of the car. Although the front wing provides downforce, it must also set up the air optimally for the rest of the car to benefit from.
The trailing edge is also smoothed out over the wing’s span, with the flap adjuster mechanism moved slightly further in-board to open up space for the increasingly complex rear element junction points. Many teams have experimented with using minimally sized attachment points to add curls and exposed tips to strengthen the airflow shed from this area, and Racing Bulls’ latest car largely picks up from where its predecessor left off in this area.
Overall, the differences between the VCARB 01 and 02 are not glaring, but there is clear evolution here. And this all comes against the backdrop of the team’s infrastructural changes that have brought it geographically closer to Red Bull’s lead operations in Milton Keynes, as its UK operations have left the Bicester facilities it once occupied – these, the team had previously explained, had become far too small for the growth of the Racing Bulls operation.
With renewed efforts from its midfield rivals, Racing Bulls will have a tough job on its hands to achieve last year’s ambition of finishing sixth overall in the constructors’ championship
This also furthers the technological links with Red Bull too; once the engine operation is up and running for 2026, Racing Bulls will be right next to it – and will also be very close to the new wind tunnel once that comes online next year. This adds to the technology-sharing deal the two teams have within the bounds of the rules, which primarily involves the gearbox and suspension packages.
Team principal Laurent Mekies explained what the team was looking to get out of the new VCARB 02, underlining the key areas that he thought were up for improvement in last year’s car. He also conceded that the first part of the 2025 season might be tough, suggesting that the team was going to invest heavily in improvements in the early phase of the year to make the most of its new facilities.
“In terms of what we were looking for I think there is two streams – in terms of car characteristics, we wanted to have a car that performs a bit more consistently compared to last year,” he said. “We had very good moments last year. We had more difficult races, so in terms of overall target, we have tried to understand what made our car not so consistent last year.
Mekies has overseen Racing Bulls’ move into a new Milton Keynes base and develop its 2025 challenger this winter
Photo by: Getty Images
“Hopefully, we will be able to address some of that and we have done that in parallel with evolving the team, to continue to build the team. I’m not here to tell you that we think we have solved all of our competitiveness issues, but certainly the team is gelling together in the right directions. We moved into our Milton Keynes facility on 2 January, so we have now two very good headquarters.
“Is it really yet to say the car is up there? No, we don’t think it is yet, and we expect a tough first part of the season – but with the conviction that the direction of travel is the right one.”
In any case, the car is at least pretty – but with renewed efforts from its midfield rivals, Racing Bulls will have a tough job on its hands to achieve last year’s ambition of finishing sixth overall in the constructors’ championship. What it has, however, is a new base to build on, and one that the team’s key personnel believe will help to raise its level over the coming years.
Subscribe to Autosport Plus for more Formula 1 technical and in-depth analysis ahead of the 2025 season.
What can Racing Bulls produce in 2025?
Photo by: Red Bull Content Pool
In this article
Jake Boxall-Legge
Formula 1
RB
Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics
Cookies
To make this site work properly, we sometimes place small data files called cookies on your device. This enables us to improve our website to provide a better user experience. No personal data is collected.
