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Sharing the RB garage with Daniel Ricciardo through the Singapore Grand Prix event knowing that he’d be ousting the Australian veteran from his Formula 1 seat after it was “definitely not an enjoyable weekend” for Liam Lawson - who has suggested he knew a fortnight beforehand what was about to happen.
Hours after official confirmation that he was returning to the F1 grid in Ricciardo’s place, Lawson gave an extensive interview to New Zealand radio channel Newstalk ZB.
WHEN HE KNEW + HOW RICCIARDO HANDLED IT
Though there had been abundant rumours about Lawson replacing Ricciardo either mid-season or for 2025, Ricciardo appeared from the outside to only learn of the immediate reality of that prospect as the Singapore weekend progressed.
He went from answering questions on the story with puzzlement but acceptance that it might be true on Friday to fully accepting that his F1 career had probably just ended last Sunday night.
Lawson, present in the garage all weekend in his reserve role, apparently knew what was coming long before Ricciardo did.
“Obviously I knew about it for the last sort of two weeks,” he told Newstalk ZB.
“But until it’s out there to the world it obviously doesn’t really feel set and it’s not like I could tell anybody.”
Asked by interviewer Mike Hosking how it felt to be sharing the garage with Ricciardo when “Ricciardo is clearly being sacked and everybody knows, and they know that you know”, Lawson admitted it had been awkward to say the least.
“Not good, honestly,” he replied.
“Singapore was definitely not an enjoyable weekend for me, just because obviously we all knew what was coming.
“And Daniel has always been very good to me in a lot of ways.
“When I drove last year [Ricciardo's Zandvoort 2023 injury having given Lawson his F1 racing debut] and even this season, I’ve never felt in competition with him or anything like that, he never made it feel like that. So it wasn’t a nice feeling.
“But obviously for me, I get one shot at F1 and it’s come now, and I’m obviously grateful for that opportunity but I now need to take it with both hands.
“He’s said the same thing to me and he said ‘you need to make the most of it’.
“He did a very good job on the weekend.
“Honestly, I have a huge amount of respect for how he dealt with everything because I can’t really imagine what that [felt like].
“It’s a similar position to what I was in last year but obviously the guy is just a lot more public, a lot more famous than I am, so he’s getting a lot of questions and trying to sidestep those. He did a very good job.”
WHEN DID RICCIARDO KNOW?
Scott Mitchell-Malm
Ascertaining exactly how Red Bull handled this is tricky given how murky it looked publicly and how many different versions of the timeline exist.
It seems pretty clear that Red Bull did indeed have the intention to make this change in advance of the Singapore weekend - maybe even earlier. It had kept not just Ricciardo but also Red Bull Racing driver Sergio Perez on a very short leash, effectively under evaluation in each weekend.
Presumably, Perez’s decent form on the return after the break at Zandvoort and Monza solidified his position and - with Lawson needing a race seat of some kind by the end of September - that put Ricciardo on the chopping block. Perez’s strong Baku weekend would only have underlined such a situation.
However, there is a discrepancy between what Lawson has now stated publicly and what Ricciardo is understood to have experienced.
While Ricciardo went into the Singapore weekend with a good idea that something could happen, and it has even been claimed that he was told before Singapore as well, The Race understands there had been no such final communication.
That is why on Thursday, Ricciardo spoke the way he did in his media sessions: that he was aware a change was probable for 2025 but, while he couldn’t guarantee he’d see out this season, doing so was his current expectation as he hadn’t been told anything to the contrary. Red Bull’s official and unofficial lines through the weekend were also that no final decision was made.
So, was Lawson told something nobody else was: that it was a done deal? Or was he not quite told it as a guarantee that this would happen when it did and how it did?
Whatever the answer, all it does is reinforce the feeling that Red Bull handled this poorly.
'THE PLAN FOR A LONG TIME'
Lawson was not completely precise on the timeline of when taking Ricciardo’s seat went from possibility to certainty. It had long been known in the paddock that Lawson would become a free agent if Red Bull didn’t commit to a 2025 F1 seat for him by the end of this month, but there wasn’t thought to be any during-2024 stipulation.
But Lawson’s understanding of the situation had long been that he would be in a race seat after that gap.
“It had been the plan for a long time now, this was sort of where it was leading at least,” he said.
“Obviously I had a contract date that needed to be sort of fulfilled.
“So basically it was always going towards this way and then a couple of weeks ago they told me this was what was going to happen and not long after that it was set in stone.”
SUMMER TEST WAS CRUCIAL
Lawson’s last on-track mileage in an F1 car was around two months ago at the start of the summer break, when he was out in a 2022 AlphaTauri at Monza.
Given how much speculation there had been all season about RB or Red Bull line-up changes and Lawson’s place in that jigsaw, this was seen as a significant evaluation test.
And Lawson confirmed that had been the case, replying “no” when asked if his late-2024 chance was set in stone regardless of how that test went.
“It was all evaluation days and they were designed to put lots of pressure on me,” he said.
“It was for an event like this, to throw me in - a bit like last year - mid-season.
“They needed to know that I would somewhat perform. They were definitely evaluation days.”
RB OR RED BULL FOR 2025?
Given Ricciardo had been performing respectably alongside Yuki Tsunoda at RB in recent months after a shaky start to the season, there hadn’t seemed to be any urgent need to drop him before the end of the year even if Red Bull wanted Lawson in the car longer term.
The fact the change has happened now could mean Red Bull wants to use these races to evaluate Lawson as a potential 2025 replacement for the often-struggling Sergio Perez in its main team. He (and, ironically, Ricciardo) had already been in contention to do just that during this season had Red Bull gone ahead with dropping Perez in the summer break.
Lawson answered questions about his situation beyond the remaining 2024 races very carefully.
He replied “that’s correct” when asked if for now he just had clarity over the rest of 2024 and didn’t know if he’d have an F1 race seat for 2025.
“I’ve basically got until the end of this season and then I’ll find out more as the season goes on. At this stage, it’s the six races,” Lawson continued.
Asked if he knew what performance was required over those six races to ensure he had a 2025 F1 seat, he replied: “I need to perform, basically. I need to try to obviously show my worth in F1 and I would say do a similar job to what I did last year. That’s what’s given me the shot now.
“I just need to do enough to stay in the seat next year.”
