Yuki Tsunoda's Red Bull stint was never going to be easy, but few expected it to unravel so dramatically. Thrown into the deep end just three races into the 2025 Formula 1 season as Liam Lawson's replacement, the Japanese driver found himself grappling with a car that seemed to defy understanding. Now, with the dust settled, he opens up about the costly error that defined his tenure.
Speaking on the Beyond The Grid podcast, Tsunoda offered a strikingly candid assessment of his struggles with the RB21. "Normally I'm able to understand the car, what I'm driving, what kind of characteristic," he said. "But it feels like even after Abu Dhabi, I didn't know what kind of car I was driving. I still don't understand what was the issue and what things made me very struggle to learn about this car and get used to the car. I thought confidence was there, but some race I just somehow lost the confidence. I still don't understand the car, to be honest."
The admission lays bare the depth of his frustration. Tsunoda, known for his adaptability, found himself lost in a machine that demanded a unique touch. And that's when he made what he now considers his biggest blunder: attempting to mimic the set-up choices of his teammate, Max Verstappen.
"One thing about myself: I have big enough ego to not change my driving style," Tsunoda explained. "I know what I'm doing in terms of driving and I believe in myself. So, I never try to change my driving style to another driver's, even though the driver is competitive and fast. Obviously for Max, it's a different case. He's a world champion, he proves a lot of things and I still learn a lot of things from his driving. My core driving is the same. And at some time, probably the first year out of any years since I started, I thought about changing driving style and trying to do something similar to Max. But in my perspective, if I just look at data, I didn't really see a huge difference in terms of driving."
Yet, despite recognizing the futility, Tsunoda persisted with the strategy. "What I did most – and what I think now was the biggest mistake last year – was to try to replicate the set-up, what he's doing; even knowing that sometimes, if I feel the car very oversteer, Max's [set-up] in theory makes the car worse, more sensitive in the direction change, or makes the car slide more. I tend to choose the set-up, even though I'm already struggling with oversteer. It can happen sometimes the opposite way as well: even though I'm struggling with understeer, his car is more understeer. I try to replicate that."
The result was a vicious cycle. Instead of closing the gap to Verstappen, Tsunoda spiraled further into inconsistency. The pressure at Red Bull only intensified, and by the end of the season, the team decided to part ways, dropping him for 2026. It was a harsh outcome for a driver who had shown promise at Racing Bulls.
Tsunoda's story serves as a cautionary tale about the perils of imitation in F1. Every driver has a unique style, and forcing a square peg into a round hole rarely works. "I still learn a lot from his driving," he acknowledges. "But my core driving is the same." As he looks to the future, Tsunoda must rediscover the confidence that once made him a standout, perhaps by returning to an environment where he can be himself behind the wheel.
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