Helmut Marko explains Liam Lawson’s ‘wrong decision’ in pre-season testing

Liam Lawson did a “good job” on his first day of pre-season testing as a Red Bull driver says Helmut Marko… and then came the “but.”

Lawson was the first of the Red Bull drivers out on track on Wednesday morning as pre-season testing got underway at the Bahrain International Circuit.

Helmut Marko: ‘It was logical that it was a wrong decision’

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

The New Zealander, who replaces the ousted Sergio Perez as Max Verstappen’s latest Red Bull team-mate, was in contention for P1 throughout the morning session, trading fastest lap times with Lewis Hamilton, Alex Albon and Fernando Alonso before Andrea Kimi Antonelli crossed the line in the final hour before lunch with a 1:31.428.

That put the Mercedes rookie 0.132s ahead of Lawson with former Red Bull driver Albon a further 0.013s off the pace.

But when all was said and done for the day and all ten teams had swapped their drivers for the afternoon session, which had better conditions despite an hour-long stop for a power failure, Lawson was down in eighth place. The top six, including Max Verstappen in third, all set their times in the afternoon.

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Lawson was almost nine-tenths down on his new team-mate with Marko revealing the 23-year-old made a change in the car that went in the “wrong decision.”

It was, he reckons, “logical” that it wasn’t the right way to go and it cost Lawson as he wasn’t able to make the expected gains when he swapped the hard Pirelli tyres for a set of mediums.

Asked for his initial thoughts on Lawson’s first pre-season outing for Red Bull, Marko told the Dutch media at the track: “Did a good job. He just couldn’t gain the when he changed from hard to medium.

“I think he also changed something on the car, which didn’t work, but inside it was logical that it was a wrong decision. So everybody was gaining three to five tenths and he just gained one-tenth.”

Asked if Lawson is “different” in his behaviour and how he is adapting to the team than his predecessor Perez, Marko replied: “Yes. He’s far more enthusiastic.”

Told “that’s his age”, the 81-year-old quipped: “Yeah, that’s age. No. No. You don’t [say] anything wrong.”

Lawson made just one notable mistake on Wednesday as he lost control of the RB21, spinning the car in a squeal of tyres as he managed to keep it from getting beached in the gravel.

Despite destroying the tyres, he managed to get through his morning’s programme and will be the in car for the entire day on Thursday before handing it over to Verstappen for the final day.

“I had so much fun out there,” he said, “and it was so good to finally drive the new car properly and do some laps. It feels okay but obviously it is very early days, so it’s very much about learning at the moment.

“For me, there is a lot more to come because I need to learn a lot moving teams but from a team side we are just trying to learn about the new car, and optimise these testing days.

“We had a plan of test items, and we managed to go through the whole plan, which is always good. We go into tomorrow with a lot more running and a better idea of where to improve the car.

“It’s hard to tell where we are in terms of pace but the car feels good to drive and comfortable. Testing is just as important to me, as it is for the team to learn about the car. It’s crucial to maximise these days before Melbourne.”