Red Bull under pressure? Marko says Racing Bulls not much slower than Verstappen’s car. Helmut Marko defends the decision to swap Lawson for Tsunoda.

Helmut Marko defends the Tsunoda-Lawson swap
Six points in four GPs and one Sprint Race: that’s the tally collected by Yuki Tsunoda since the Red Bull management decided to carry out the much-debated seat swap with Liam Lawson, starting from the GP in “his” Japan. Not an impressive record, though clearly better than Lawson’s, who is still stuck at zero in the standings. The problem, however, is that Max Verstappen is practically playing a different game, having collected 63 points in the same span. Yet Helmut Marko is convinced that the decision to demote the New Zealander and promote the Japanese driver was the right one.

“It was the correct move,” said the 82-year-old Red Bull executive in an interview with Bild. “Because Yuki is much closer to Max than Liam ever was. He finished in the points already in his second race with Red Bull; it was an excellent performance and proof that we made the right choice. When was the last time we had two cars in the top 10? I can’t even remember.”

“Lawson wouldn’t have coped with the pressure at Red Bull,” Marko added, “and that’s why I believe giving his seat to another driver was the right call. We know what we’re doing, and we haven’t abandoned him. Liam is still in Formula 1 and holds one of only 20 seats available in the world. We didn’t kick him out; we assigned him to Racing Bulls. They welcomed him well, and his performance is improving.”

Racing Bulls not that inferior to Red Bull
And the truth is, Racing Bulls isn’t even that much worse than Red Bull, as shown by the five points collected in the last four races by Isack Hadjar, compared to Yuki Tsunoda’s six. A thought clearly expressed even by Marko himself: “Pierre Gasly also had to go back to the junior team after a negative experience at Red Bull, and now he’s an experienced F1 driver. The same applies to Alex Albon, who didn’t make a career with us and had to go through DTM before driving for Williams. And above all, I wouldn’t say this can currently be considered a demotion. The difference between Racing Bulls and Red Bull isn’t that big…”