Tsunoda needs more time to push 2025 Red Bull F1 car to the maximum

Yuki Tsunoda believes he still needs more time to push the Red Bull Formula 1 car to the maximum after a mixed start to life at the team. 

The Japanese driver started the 2025 season with sister squad Racing Bulls, but then replaced the underperforming Liam Lawson at Red Bull after just two grands prix.

Although Tsunoda has been an improvement on Lawson, the 24-year-old has only scored two points in his three grands prix aboard the difficult-to-drive RB21 - citing qualifying as an area to improve as he struggles to get to grips with the car. 

“It just needs more time, I guess, to get used to it fully,” said Tsunoda ahead of this weekend’s Miami Grand Prix.

“I think I'm happy with the progress so far, and I think the confidence is quite there. But just when you push 100% on the limit in qualifying, which you kind of face almost [for the] first time in qualifying, right? Because you don't really push 100% until then. 

“In qualifying, most of the time so far, I experienced a new kind of behaviour from my car and just not able to sometimes cope with it. But I wouldn't say the car is super, super difficult, it just needs more time and to define where the limit is."

Yuki Tsunoda, Red Bull Racing

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Tsunoda has arguably taken on the most difficult job in F1, which is being the team-mate of four-time world champion Max Verstappen, whose very particular driving style requires a certain type of car.

Many of his team-mates have struggled to cope with this, so Tsunoda joined a Red Bull squad that was struggling with its machinery, as discrepancies between the track and the team’s wind tunnel resulted in issues with the car. 

"I would say it's not complicated to drive around,” Tsunoda added. "It's not easy, for sure, [but] what I felt in the VCARB was a bit more lenient and a bit more forgiving with any directions. 

"Definitely Red Bull has a sharper, kind of narrower window that they can form, which I think being a window to drive around is still not easier than a VCARB, but better than I thought initially when I jumped into Red Bull.”  

While off the pace compared with Verstappen, Tsunoda is learning. He scored his first points for Red Bull with ninth in his second race in Bahrain, but then crashed out a week later in Saudi Arabia.  

Now, as he prepares to enter his fourth race with Red Bull, Tsunoda said he knows what he “wants to work on” in order to get to grips with his new car, but conceded that race-winning pace won’t be easy to come by.  

“Sometimes you just have to accept the kind of difficulties of the car,” he said. Sometimes if you're feeling kind of a little oversteer, a little understeer, if still lap time is good, just probably stick to the direction.”