Red Bull Racing never seem to be far away from a driver crisis and that proved to be the case once again during the 2024 Formula 1 season.
The last time all four drivers stayed the same within Red Bull’s teams for two consecutive seasons was in 2022.
Yuki Tsunoda was alongside Pierre Gasly at AlphaTauri, while Max Verstappen was a newly crowned world champion at Red Bull with Sergio Perez as his able deputy.
Since then, Gasly has moved on to Alpine, Nyck de Vries and Daniel Ricciardo have been and gone at RB and Liam Lawson enjoyed two cameo stints alongside Tsunoda.
This winter has been no different with Red Bull deciding to drop Perez and replace him with Lawson, allowing Isack Hadjar to step up from Formula 2 to make his F1 debut in 2025.
It means that in the last four years, there have been just two constants within the Red Bull family: Verstappen has been the dominant force in Formula 1 and Tsunoda has been ready and waiting for his opportunity to step up.
Tsunoda impressed in a test for Red Bull after the season ended, but by then it was too late to convince the likes of team principal Christian Horner and chief advisor Helmut Marko that he should be handed his chance against Verstappen this year.
David Coulthard knows all about the inner workings of Red Bull having been one of their founding drivers and an ambassador for the team ever since he retired.
Speaking on the Formula For Success Podcast, he explained that Tsunoda failed to convince Red Bull that he could ever be a world champion and that ultimately cost him in his head-to-head battle with Lawson.
David Coulthard thinks Red Bull have never seen Yuki Tsunoda as a potential world champion
Talking about the driver changes that have taken place this winter, Coulthard said: “Yuki [was] understandably disappointed that having had a very strong season, he wasn’t given the chance at Red Bull Racing.
“But I guess ultimately for Red Bull, they asked the question, do they think he’s a future World Champion? Do they think he’s a Max beater?
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“And again, as always, this isn’t opinions, this is facts. They’ve got all the data on him.
“And on [the] one hand, you could say if Yuki had better options outside of what is now the renamed Racing Bulls team, then he would have taken it.
“So, I think at the end, this is a big opportunity for all these guys and it’s going to be very interesting to see how they perform when they’re out on track.”
David Coulthard changed his mind on Yuki Tsunoda last season
The frustration for Tsunoda that he’s been overlooked again will be palpable and it’s going to be fascinating to see how he reacts at the first race of the new season in Australia.
Tsunoda’s 2024 campaign was the strongest of his burgeoning F1 career and his ability to outperform a proven race winner in Ricciardo shows the steps forward he’s taken this year.
Coulthard has admitted that Tsunoda surprised him last season given how much he improved over the course of the year.
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Unfortunately, for Tsunoda, he couldn’t change the opinions of Horner and Marko enough to earn his shot in the top team.
Although he’s nowhere near Nico Hulkenberg’s record for the longest stint in F1 without a podium, it’s an achievement he’ll want to get under his belt sooner rather than later.
That’s going to be very difficult to achieve at Racing Bulls – although Gasly and Sebastian Vettel won races with the team – and it may sting for Tsunoda to see Lawson up on the rostrum for the first time if and when he manages to achieve that feat.
