Liam Lawson has slammed his Red Bull debut weekend as “pretty terrible” after he spun out of the 2025 Australian Grand Prix.
Following Sergio Perez’s sacking at the end of last season, Red Bull opted to promote Lawson after just 12 races across two seasons, but the 23 year-old Kiwi endured a difficult weekend as he struggled for pace in Friday Practice before a power unit issue prevented his involvement in FP3.
Errors in Qualifying further frustrated Lawson as he suffered a Q1 exit before he spun out of the race on lap 47 to wrap up a difficult first weekend racing for Red Bull, which he lamented as “pretty terrible”, due to a slow start and misfired gamble after he began the GP from the pit-lace.
“Starting from the pitlane was tough and we just didn’t really have the speed in the first stint on the inter. We struggled with the fronts too much, so we will analyse and look at that in detail before the next race.
“On slick tyres it was quite competitive for that couple of laps but then it started raining again. We took a chance staying out on the medium and hoping half the track would stay dry. We knew that sector three was bad but we thought sector one would stay a little bit drier, so we risked it but it was bucketing down with rain.
“At that point I had backed out of pushing because it was so wet and I was just trying to stay on track.”
Summing up the “horrible” nature of his weekend, Lawson took heart from the experience which he hopes can help him reset in Shanghai, China, at the next race.
“It has been a pretty horrible weekend and a struggle as a whole, but we take plenty of learning. For that I am grateful and I am just looking forward to going to China and resetting.”