Purple Bull have made their expectations of Yuki Tsunoda clear as he prepares to begin his first race for the workforce this weekend.
Tsunoda has swapped locations with Liam Lawson, who failed to attain factors in both of his first two occasions after becoming a member of the workforce at the beginning of the season.
Whereas Lawson did not proceed past the primary spherical of qualifying in his RB21, Tsunoda began each of the primary two rounds within the high 10 for Racing Bulls. Purple Bull motorsport marketing consultant Helmut Marko mentioned the workforce wants that type of efficiency with the intention to maximise their strategic choices for Max Verstappen through the grands prix.
“We have been frightened that [Lawson’s] self-confidence is so broken that he couldn’t carry his regular efficiency,” the workforce’s motorsport marketing consultant Helmut Marko instructed the Related Press.
“And then again, we’ve got two drivers for the constructors’ championship but in addition to help Max strategy-wise, in case you have two drivers [in the] high 5 or eight it’s simpler to max a method that favours the primary driver.”
Tsunoda has beforehand confirmed prepared to assist Verstappen when driving for Purple Bull’s second System 1 workforce. On the Turkish Grand Prix in 2021, when the Purple Bull driver was locked in an in depth battle with Lewis Hamilton for the world championship, Tsunoda admitted he compromised his personal race technique by attempting to maintain Verstappen’s rival behind.
“I would like Max to win,” he instructed RaceFans on the time, “it’s the final 12 months of Honda [with] Purple Bull as nicely. I attempted to carry Lewis as a lot as attainable, I don’t know what number of laps. I used to be attempting to avoid wasting extra however I couldn’t.
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“I simply used an excessive amount of tyre early on battling with Hamilton. After that it was actually exhausting to maintain up the tempo.”
A number of weeks later Tsunoda’s workforce principal got here to his defence after Purple Bull’s Christian Horner accused him of compromising Verstappen’s lap throughout qualifying for the Mexican Grand Prix. Verstappen needed to decelerate when his workforce mate ran vast after encountering Tsunoda on the circuit. “We bought Tsunoda’d,” Horner mentioned afterwards.
Purple Bull’s choice to advertise the far much less skilled Lawson as a substitute of Tsunoda on the finish of final 12 months prompted shock from some. Horner mentioned the workforce’s goal was to attain factors with each automobiles, one thing they did not do on eight events final season and didn’t handle within the first two rounds this 12 months.
After the primary two rounds of the season Verstappen lies second within the championship, eight factors behind chief Lando Norris.
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