Horner confirms Lawson set for grid penalty at first race back in Austin

Liam Lawson will have “a soft re-entry” to Formula 1 at the upcoming United States Grand Prix, according to Red Bull team boss Christian Horner, with the New Zealander due to serve an engine-related grid penalty.

Red Bull’s sister team, RB, recently confirmed that Lawson is to take Daniel Ricciardo’s place alongside Yuki Tsunoda for the remainder of the season, adding to his super-sub stint under the operation’s AlphaTauri guise in 2023.

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However, Horner has confirmed that, under current plans, Lawson’s comeback weekend at the Circuit of The Americas will feature a grid drop, given he is inheriting the pool of power unit components used by Ricciardo up to this point in the campaign.

Asked in an appearance on the F1 Nation podcast about his hopes for Lawson, with Austin also marking a Sprint weekend, Horner began: “Well, he’ll be taking an engine penalty anyway, so he’s got a bit of a soft landing, or a soft re-entry.

“But of course, he’s going to be gauged against his team mate. He was very quick against him last year. I think Yuki’s stepped it up a gear again this year. It’s just going to be fascinating to see how quickly he adapts, how quickly he gets on with it.”

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Across the three races both drivers finished during their five-round spell as team mates last season, Lawson beat Tsunoda twice, as well as making headlines with a standout run to Q3 and the points in Singapore.

Pushed on his expectations for Lawson in the races ahead, Horner added: “It’s difficult to say. Last year, Liam was quick from the outset. He’s a tough racer and he’s very adaptable. Certainly, the testing that he’s done for us in the Red Bull Racing car this year has been very encouraging.

“We know that Yuki is a very, very fast driver. He can definitely extract a lap and as he’s matured – because he’s not a rookie anymore, he’s in his fourth season of Grand Prix racing – he’s got a lot of experience under his belt now.

“Taking him as the data point, we saw where Daniel compared to Yuki, [so] it will just be very interesting to see how Liam performs over the remaining six races.”

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Lawson slots into RB’s full-time driver line-up with the squad sitting sixth in the constructors’ standings on 34 points, ahead of Haas on 31, Williams on 16 and Alpine on 13.