Tsunoda puts himself back on the F1 radar after just missing the points in Zandvoort

In finishing P11 at Zandvoort he might not have made the points, but nevertheless Yuki Tsunoda was able to use his one-off appearance with Racing Bulls to put himself back on the radar of the Formula 1 pitlane.

After his somewhat disastrous season with Red Bull in 2025 it was hard to imagine him ever finding a way back to a race seat.

A solid Dutch Grand Prix weekend in an unfamiliar VCARB 03 served as a calling card though, reminding everyone that Tsunoda is one of the most experienced and best qualified drivers currently sitting on the sidelines.

And while it’s hard to see a way forward in the Red Bull camp given the talent there – with F2 championship leader Nikola Tsolov waiting in the wings – his prospects of finding something elsewhere have to be better than they were prior to last weekend.

Although he hadn’t raced since Abu Dhabi last December, Tsunoda has not been idle. Testing of Previous Car (TPC) runs in an older Red Bull chassis kept him sharp, and he’s spent a lot of time driving the current RB22 in the Milton Keynes simulator, which gave him a good insight into how to use the 2026 Ford power unit.

The last minute nature of the Zandvoort decision meant that he was only able to try Racing Bulls' VCARB 03 in the sim on the Wednesday before the race, but that did at least give him a head start.

After the single hour of FP1, it was straight into Sprint Qualifying. He was P13 in SQ1 and then P12 in SQ2, just behind Liam Lawson – the man he was subbing for.

The key parameter was the 0.360s delta to team mate Arvid Lindblad – not bad given Tsunoda’s unfamiliarity with the car, but on the other hand this was also the Briton’s first day of running at the track.

In the Sprint, Tsunoda lost a place to Franco Colapinto and finished P13, gaining a lot of useful knowledge along the way – he was also relieved that a first corner tap on Lindblad didn’t hinder either Racing Bulls driver.

He was more confident for Qualifying, taking P8 in Q1 and P12 once again in Q2. His improved form was reflected by a smaller 0.102s gap to his team mate in that session.

“Honestly, I'm super happy,” he said. “Certainly, I enjoyed so much this Qualifying. Yesterday's [Sprint] Qualifying was okay, but didn't know where the limit was still, it was still a fresh car.

“But this was a proper Qualifying, and I was able to trust more the car and throw the car into the corners. It's still like a fourth session, and I know where I can improve much more. But honestly, I miss this kind of feeling, chasing the last few milliseconds, last few tenths – and I'm super enjoying it.”

Tsunoda confirmed after Qualifying for the Grand Prix that Saturday's Sprint had been a valuable training exercise: “It was very, very useful, certainly for the race, it was good that I had that before the race start. And every procedure, every deploy management is a lot different. So I think it was good, important for the race, and those 24 laps, every single lap, I able to able to learn, and I think I was able to prove that in this Qualifying.

“Every single session I am coming closer and closer. I wish I had one more session, one more Round. But still, one more session to go, which is the race, and close to the points. So I'm excited.”

For Racing Bulls, the main task in Zandvoort was to mitigate any points loss to closest rivals Alpine. Both teams lost out when Lindblad and Colapinto picked up drive-through penalties for passing under yellows during the Verstappen/Bortoleto chaos in the opening lap – and their early unplanned pit visits after the restart put them out of the hunt for points.

It thus became a contest between Tsunoda and his friend and former team mate Pierre Gasly with a battle that lasted for much of the race.

By staying out, Lindblad also got involved at one point and tried to help Tsunoda by keeping the Alpine behind, but in the end Gasly had the performance to get ahead and claim P10 and the final point.

“Honestly, I think I was able to progress faster than I expected,” Tsunoda said of his weekend. “I drove only four times out of eight months since last year in Abu Dhabi, so with that, I did pretty well.

“Thanks to Red Bull, they kept me pretty sharp with the simulator and those things. But certainly, I definitely enjoyed it overall, and yeah, I think I gave it 100%, as much as I can. I think I did pretty okay."

He conceded that there was much to take on board: “The challenging part was pretty much everything, a lot of things learning about deployment, buttons, everything – every procedure is different.

“This race was challenging for degradation, degradation characteristics were a lot different, so hard to adapt. Honestly, the team supported me a lot and they made it easy for me to drive as fast as possible. Obviously it's shame that I didn't score points. But I take it, fighting against top eight, top nine, until the last few laps, I would say."

The chances of Tsunoda finding a race seat remain slim given how few opportunities there are. However, he’s now in a better situation than he was before Zandvoort.

"I know what I can do,” he said. “And I think I pretty much showed also what I can do to most of the paddock, with just one race, a couple of sessions. I was able to fight close to the points. I think the outcome was obviously better scoring points, but I think I did as much as I can for that.

“It's definitely better having this opportunity rather than not having any opportunity, not being able to show the paddock what I can do with these regulations. So I think that this was overall positive, and I think what performance I showed, I think, is positive.

“So it's up to my manager, and also other teams who are not decided yet about the next year's lineup, if they want to have me or not – but they should!”