{"id":802477,"date":"2026-07-15T20:06:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T20:06:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/802477\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T20:06:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T20:06:11","slug":"liam-lawson-rumours-addressed-as-red-bull-insider-backs-tsolov","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/802477\/","title":{"rendered":"Liam Lawson rumours addressed as Red Bull insider backs Tsolov"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Coulthard says we should \u201clisten for\u201d the name of Red Bull<\/a> junior Nikola Tsolov. Rumours of pressure on the seat of Liam Lawson<\/a>, amid Tsolov\u2019s rise, were recently quashed.<\/p>\n

Coulthard teased the idea of Tsolov, the Formula 2 Championship leader, being positioned by Red Bull elsewhere on the F1 2027 grid, should there be no room at the inn with its four seats. Racing Bulls CEO Peter Bayer recently denied the suggestion that Tsolov is guaranteed an F1 2027 seat with the team.<\/p>\n

Tsolov backed as clarity arrives on Liam Lawson rumours<\/p>\n

Want more PlanetF1.com coverage? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for news you can trust.<\/p>\n

Tsolov is turning heads in Formula 2. At Silverstone, he made history by becoming the first driver to win three consecutive F2 races.<\/p>\n

That included doing the double at Silverstone, winning the sprint and feature race. That in itself is a very hard, and rare achievement to pull off, due to the reverse grid format which exists for F2 sprints.<\/p>\n

Logically, the next step for Tsolov would be to conduct a TPC test [Testing of Previous Cars] to obtain his licence to compete in an FP1 session. Bayer told Sky F1 that this is in the works.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re planning that for the autumn.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for landing an F1 race seat, a driver must score 40 points to obtain their necessary FIA Super Licence. Tsolov is on course to achieve that through his 2026 results alone.<\/p>\n

A top three finish in the F2 standings is worth 40 points. Tsolov currently leads the way by 17 points from Alpine-backed Gabriele Mini. The driver in P4, Alex Dunne, is 49 behind Tsolov.<\/p>\n

The rise of Tsolov, the 19-year-old from Sofia, Bulgaria, sparked unfounded rumours that he was poised to replace Liam Lawson<\/a> at Racing Bulls, the Red Bull junior F1 team, from F1 2027.<\/p>\n

PlanetF1.com understands the speculation to be wide of the mark. Bayer further suggested so when quizzed by Sky F1 on the rumours that Tsolov will drive for Racing Bulls next season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose are just rumours,\u201d he insisted.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s doing a brilliant job and is a huge talent whom we naturally have on our radar.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut we\u2019ve only had seven races so far, and Liam and Arvid [Lindblad] are doing just as brilliant a job. So it\u2019s not even on the cards at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, Lawson is piecing together his most impressive F1 season to date, while rookie teammate Arvid Lindblad has made a fine start to Formula 1 life.<\/p>\n

At the senior Red Bull team, Isack Hadjar is proving to be arguably Max Verstappen\u2019s most competitive teammate since Daniel Ricciardo.<\/p>\n

During an Up To Speed podcast appearance, it was suggested to Coulthard, the former Red Bull F1 driver who remains with the team as an ambassador, that Red Bull finds itself in a situation of having more talented drivers than seats, factoring Tsolov into the equation.<\/p>\n

Coulthard is \u201clooking forward\u201d to seeing Tsolov \u201cin Formula 1,\u201d and suggested that Red Bull could place their exciting young talent elsewhere on the F1 2027 grid for now if needs be.<\/p>\n

Of course, Lawson does not necessarily need to make way for Tsolov to find a Red Bull F1 opening.<\/p>\n

Verstappen\u2019s Red Bull future has become the biggest talking point of F1 2026. There could be opportunity for Tsolov depending on how that situation resolves itself.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a good problem to have,\u201d said Coulthard of the Red Bull driver pool dilemma.<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess there\u2019s always a possibility, if they\u2019re happy with the others, that they could help position him [Tsolov] somewhere else.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think Red Bull are ahead of the game in terms of their motorsports investment and drivers over the history of time, if you look at what they\u2019ve invested and now what the valuations are.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I don\u2019t think they\u2019re thinking, \u2018Well, we\u2019re getting to the limit of what we can afford to invest in this.\u2019 So it\u2019s a good problem to have.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I think, listen for that name, Nikola Tsolov from Bulgaria. Drives very well. Is a great personality out of the car as well. Looking forward to seeing him in Formula 1.\u201d<\/p>\n

More on Liam Lawson and Nikola Tsolov from PlanetF1.com<\/p>\n

Racing Bulls responds to Nikola Tsolov rumours as Liam Lawson future questioned<\/a><\/p>\n

Liam Lawson quizzed on F1 future as new Red Bull talent emerges<\/a><\/p>\n

Tsolov already has one title to his name, having won the 2022 Spanish F4 Championship in dominant fashion.<\/p>\n

Tsolov won the title with Campos. He rekindled this alliance in Formula 3, which coincided with a performance breakthrough, one which has continued with the step up to F2 with the Spanish squad.<\/p>\n

Want to be the first to know exclusive information from the F1 paddock? Join our broadcast channel on WhatsApp<\/a> to get the scoop on the latest developments from our team of accredited journalists.<\/p>\n

You can also subscribe to the PlanetF1 YouTube channel<\/a> for exclusive features, hear from our paddock journalists with stories from the heart of Formula 1 and much more!<\/p>\n

Read next \u2013 F1 Fast Track: Red Bull\u2019s Nikola Tsolov supercharges F1 2027 bid<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Coulthard says we should \u201clisten for\u201d the name of Red Bull junior Nikola Tsolov. Rumours of pressure…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":802478,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,818,3352,44,206381,9107,918,85],"class_list":["post-802477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-home-page","tag-liam-lawson","tag-news","tag-nikola-tsolov","tag-racing-bulls","tag-red-bull","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/802477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=802477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/802477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/802478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=802477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=802477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=802477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}