Purple Bull Racing workforce principal Christian Horner admits there’s a hazard of Liam Lawson struggling inside the workforce’s setting by being promoted too quickly.
Lawson has been picked to companion Max Verstappen in 2025 regardless of having began simply 11 grands prix, with the extra skilled Yuki Tsunoda neglected to exchange Sergio Perez. The Mexican had been introduced in after each Pierre Gasly and Alex Albon struggled within the Purple Bull seat early of their careers, and Horner acknowledges the dangers which can be related to younger drivers.
“Look, the hazard is there’s a repeat of that,” Horner mentioned. “However I believe that Liam is a special character. He’s a special character to have the ability to take care of that strain. I believe he’s proven actual resilience and power of character with the chance that’s been offered to have to show up and get on with it and ship — and he’s completed that.
“The plan initially wasn’t for that to be accelerated for this 12 months. circumstances have dictated with Checo sadly not having an important season — that has been accelerated. However we consider the place Liam is on the trajectory that he’s on, that may solely enhance.
“And he drives the automotive similarly to Max. He doesn’t shrink back from having a really optimistic entrance finish within the automotive. So I believe when it comes to driving attribute, it is going to be simpler for the automobiles to run extra intently collectively in setup.”
Horner believes having a transparent hierarchy with Verstappen because the lead driver is now a special state of affairs that ought to take the strain off Lawson in comparison with juniors which have gone earlier than him.
“Daniel and Max have been a powerful pairing. We then had two juniors that struggled. And that’s why clearly Checo then stepped into the automotive for the ’21 season and coped with the pressures of that properly.
“I believe the opposite issue that we’re centered very laborious on is ensuring that we’re making a wider working window with RB21 than RB20’s very slim, very peaky efficiency window. So for us, to create a broader window will hopefully solely assist Liam discover a extra, maybe forgiving automotive than RB20 could possibly be from time to time.
“I believe one of many issues we’ll be trying to defend Liam from is expectation. In fact, when Alex and Pierre have been with the workforce, Max wasn’t a four-time world champion. He hadn’t received a world championship at that time. We now have a really clear positioning within the workforce with the place Max is at in his profession and what we want from the second driver.”
