Red Bull had already offered some justification for its decision to drop Liam Lawson from its main Formula 1 team and replace him with Yuki Tsunoda just two races into the 2025 F1 season.
But Red Bull motorsport advisor Helmut Marko has now expanded on its rationale in Red Bull's first press comments since it announced the swap.
You can typically rely on Marko for an interesting quip and, while his regular column for Speedweek was fairly standard, it was his interview with BBC Radio 5Live in particular that offered greater insight into how Red Bull views its turbulent start to the season.
Here are seven things his comments have told us.
Admission of error
As measured a justification as Red Bull offered in its announcement about the reasons for demoting Lawson, one thing was missing: any acknowledgement that it had made the wrong initial choice.
But Marko has now accepted that was the case.
"In hindsight I would say yes, we made a mistake," he said, when asked on 5Live Breakfast if Red Bull was essentially admitting as much by making such an early change.
"We had to act before Liam completely lost his confidence," Marko added in his Speedweek column.
Why there was no Suzuka stay of execution
The first two races of the season were on tracks Lawson had never driven before: Albert Park, home of the Australian Grand Prix, and the Chinese GP's Shanghai International Circuit.
So while his miserable form - Lawson was 18th, 20th and 20th in qualifying for the three races he took part in - was not at an acceptable level, those performances did come with some caveats.
When rumours about his future being in jeopardy began to emerge, they came with the suggestion that Lawson might at least get the Japanese GP - albeit in a make-or-break setting - to prove himself on a track he had previous experience of (Lawson drove at Suzuka twice in 2023; once in Super Formula and also in that year's Japanese GP while deputising for the injured Daniel Ricciardo, pictured above).
But Red Bull ultimately felt that the damage had already been done.
"Suzuka, yes, is a very difficult circuit, it's a driver's circuit," Marko told 5Live. "But we were worried that his self-confidence is so damaged that he couldn't bring his normal performance."
Lawson can bounce back (but probably elsewhere)
While suggesting that Red Bull no longer felt Lawson had the confidence to turn his situation around in the main team, Marko insisted that the decision was "for the benefit" of Lawson, and that "we must not forget that his career is not over".
Marko cited in both his Speedweek column and when talking to 5Live the examples of Pierre Gasly and Alex Albon, who like Lawson were dropped as Max Verstappen's team-mates but have since forged successful careers in F1.
"Racing Bulls has a car which is capable to be top 10 in qualifying and also in the race," Marko told 5Live, while insisting at pains that Lawson's relegation to the second team was "not a demotion".
"And just look in the past, it was Gasly [for whom it] happens the same, also to Albon, and they recovered and they are now competitive Formula 1 drivers.
"He's not kicked out of Formula 1; we are in an extraordinary position to have two Formula 1 teams and with Racing Bulls, they will give him the chance to recover and his career can start again."
He added in his Speedweek column: "Lawson's change of position is nothing unusual: we've done the same with Pierre Gasly and Alex Albon before, and both are still established drivers in Formula 1 with successful careers."
But there's an added implication with such a statement: while Red Bull believes Lawson can rediscover his confidence, if he goes onto follow the examples set by Gasly and Albon it will probably be in similar circumstances - by doing so elsewhere (Gasly at Alpine, and Albon at Williams), rather than to such an extent that he earns a return to the senior Red Bull team.
Why Tsunoda wasn't right before
"There are many know-it-alls who will now object: Why wasn't Tsunoda given preference from the start?" Marko himself asked in his Speedweek column.
So we'll let him finish that point.
"That's because Yuki's career often had ups and downs; he didn't exactly have an image of reliability and consistency," said Marko.
Expanding on that on 5Live, he said when Red Bull was making its original decision for 2025 Tsunoda's pair of crashes during the Mexican GP weekend late last year had weighed on the team's mind.
Asked to justify why Red Bull didn't think Tsunoda was the right choice at the end of last year but was now, just two races into the 2025 season, Marko said: "As I mentioned, he had two very good races, he changed his management, he is far more mature."
He referenced a "leap" in Tsunoda's development - extending to his physical preparation; "Tsunoda is now a real muscleman", Marko said - and described him as a "much stronger personality" with "more confidence".
He'll get until the end of the season
Here's one to return to if Red Bull's masterplan doesn't work out.
Asked how many races Tsunoda would be given to prove himself at the senior team, Marko said he would have until the end of 2025.
And asked subsequently to confirm that position - via a bemused "Yeah?" - he added: "Yes. Because we believe he can do the job."
Marko said though that it was merely "a coincidence that this change of position and promotion for Honda protégé Tsunoda came just before his home race in Japan and on Honda's home track".
Honda - Red Bull's engine provider until the end of this season - has always been Tsunoda's primary backer in F1, even on the extended deal he signed last year, and is understood to have thrown financial backing behind the switch.
Red Bull's already gearing itself towards one title
That aforementioned "job", Red Bull has already outlined, is not just about Tsunoda being closer to Verstappen but using his greater experience relative to Lawson to help Red Bull develop its capricious RB21.
But there's no escaping the fact that even with this change of driver, Red Bull's focus remains geared heavily towards its star driver.
So much so, in fact, that a fifth F1 drivers' title for Verstappen seems to be of far greater importance than the constructors' championship.
Marko did acknowledge to 5Live that "we have to have two drivers for the constructors' championship" but having a second car in the lead fight - something Lawson looked nowhere near achieving during his two weekends in the RB21 - was also important to "support Max, strategy-wise".
"If you have two drivers in the top five or top eight, it's easier to make a strategy which helps you to favour the number one driver."
And it probably can't afford not to do everything to go for that title, because...
...It's aware it might lose Verstappen
Though there have been no public comments saying as much, there is a suggestion that the Verstappen camp fears Red Bull doesn't know how to reassess its car development process - the RB21's limitations being evidence of a lineage of cars that have become increasingly difficult to drive.
Verstappen has never been openly critical of the competence of his team-mates in the past, and it's hard to imagine he will be throwing Lawson under the bus the way Red Bull has - so he surely won't agree with the knee-jerk nature of this swap.
So if he has been acknowledging in public how hard the car is to drive, allied to other comments about it being a “tough battle to even stay up there” at the front, then privately he is likely to have made his dissatisfaction with the lack of progress clear.
More on Tsunoda/Lawson swap
Red Bull is wasting its unique, controversial F1 driver advantage
Is Tsunoda doomed to fail at Red Bull too?
Red Bull rationale for brutal Lawson-Tsunoda U-turn explained
Red Bull replaces Lawson with Tsunoda - what you need to know
Our verdict on Red Bull's plan to swap Lawson and Tsunoda
Why Lawson has paid the price for Perez's failings
Analysis: Why Lawson is so much slower than Verstappen
Edd Straw: Trackside view badly exposes Lawson's deficit
Asked whether he felt there was a chance Verstappen might leave if he didn't have a car capable of fighting for the title, with the suggestion that he might be leading the championship in either the McLaren, Mercedes or Ferrari, Marko said: "You're definitely right, so we have to make sure that he gets a car where he can win.
"And there was a very constructive meeting last Thursday - Max with the engineers - and they discussed how to go forwards, to improve the car, and make it more driveable, to have a wider range of driveability. And all that went very positive.
"So it's just two races, we are eight points behind, and as I said before, the whole team is focused to achieve this fifth title, which we didn't make with [Sebastian] Vettel, but this time I think there is a possibility."
But while Marko felt Red Bull had been "not so much off as it looks sometimes" at the start of 2025, and insisted Red Bull was "motivated and hopeful" about its 2025 prospects, he did accept without being specific that Red Bull needed to ensure certain criteria was being hit if it wants to keep Verstappen.
"Internally, we know where the weaknesses of the car are and we have a good technical crew and they will solve the problems," he said. "Again, there's so much motivation to achieve this fifth title.
"We also know if we don't deliver to Max, it's no secret; all the top drivers have performance clauses in their contract.
"But we want to win this title, and for that the whole team is cooperating and working together as hard and as good as possible."
