The last time we saw Liam Lawson in a race car was back in October last year during the Qatar Grand Prix weekend, the last of 5 races he was driving in place of Daniel Riccardo due to his hand injury. It’s been over a year since the New Zealander was behind the wheel but he is now back as a RB driver, replacing Daniel Riccardo permanently this time.
So how did his first qualifying session back in Formula One go?
The Kiwi had shown a good return as he qualified P12 during Sprint Qualifying the day before. During Q1 on Saturday, Lawson had placed himself 3rd on the charts 0.293s behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, placing him ahead of teammate Yuki Tsunoda, and Sergio Pérez Perez.
It was looking promising for the young driver but there was the decision for him to ultimately not fight for places during Q2. It comes following the fact that Lawson faces a 60-place grid penalty for the race thanks to engine component changes.
Intriguingly, his Q1 time was quicker than Tsunoda’s Q2 effort. He gave the Japanese driver a tow on both his laps in that session.
Lawson said he thoroughly enjoyed the qualifying session.
“I think the goal was obviously to make the most of Q1, to put everything together, and I think that’s what we did.
“I think it’s obviously positive coming from yesterday into today.
“But obviously tomorrow’s race is going to be challenging from the back.”
When asked how he felt about the decision to not participate in Q2, the young Kiwi said although he was disappointed, ultimately understood the team’s decision and is picking the positives from the situation.
Nonetheless, he is wary of the race pace of the RB as both drivers struggled in the Sprint. He finished P16 in the end.
“I mean, to put that aside, it’s more just frustrating because of the performance of the car.
“The pace was pretty strong in Q1. Obviously, we’d only really improve from there, [that] is the idea. So there is plenty of positives going forward.
“Obviously, it just feels a bit of a waste, but I understand as well why we’re doing this. It completely makes sense. We didn’t know it was going to be like this.
“Racing is a whole other story. Today’s race was tough. And I’m sure tomorrow’s will be challenging as well.”
Despite it all, Lawson is happy with the progress this weekend on the driving side and is optimistic for the weekend and the following races in this triple-header.
The multi-time F2 race winner admitted he got things wrong in SQ2 on Friday, putting right those wrongs in Q1 on Saturday.
“Yesterday I knew we had performance in the car and I knew we didn’t maximise it. Obviously, I made a mistake in SQ2, went wide and had a bit of a slow lap.
“And I was frustrated because I knew the performance in the car. Then we make a further step with it today, make some changes.
“It’s just nice when you put it all together, you put the laps together.
“It feels like we completed, or at least I completed, what I set out to do getting into the car this weekend. Now we need to try and master the race side of it.
“We’ll be doing something probably a little bit different to try and move forward.
“But yes, it’s going to be challenging. We’ll try and learn as much as we can from it.”
Lawson also reflected on his tyre struggles during the Sprint and how he plans to solve them with the team before the Grand Prix.
Starting from the back, it will be a tough day for the New Zealander trying to manage the very sensitive Pirelli rubber.
“Yeah, it’s tricky because it’s even lap by lap. If you overpush your lap and struggle with the tyres, then very quickly, even in that same lap, you can struggle in the next few corners.
“So it’s finding that balance, which is what we’re trying to do. And I think we understood a good amount afterwards now, looking through the data.
“Obviously now we’ll have more time to go through it because the focus is on just racing tomorrow.”
