{"id":859904,"date":"2026-08-18T18:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T18:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/859904\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T18:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T18:28:11","slug":"f1-hopeful-keen-to-avoid-the-trouble-that-red-bull-rumours-could-bring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/859904\/","title":{"rendered":"F1 hopeful keen to avoid the ‘trouble’ that Red Bull rumours could bring"},"content":{"rendered":"

F2 Championship Leader Nikola Tsolov<\/a> has been named \u201cnext in line\u201d to make his Formula 1<\/a> debut as a Red Bull junior.<\/p>\n

The Bulgarian racing driver has established himself as one of the brightest prospects in single-seater motorsport. <\/p>\n

After finishing as runner-up in the F3 Championship last season, Tsolov currently leads the F2 standings in his first full-time season with Campos Racing. <\/p>\n

With five rounds to go, the 21-year-old could find himself looking for a race seat in F1 if he wins the F2 crown.<\/p>\n

The feeder series\u2019 rules preclude the champion from a title defence, and the 21-year-old is aware that the logical next step for him would be in the F1 paddock with the Red Bull family.<\/p>\n

Racing Bulls boss Peter Bayer has already named him \u201cnext in line\u201d for a race seat with the Faenza-based team<\/a>, but the ground realities of Tsolov securing that chance next season are pretty complex. <\/p>\n

The 2026 line-up of Liam Lawson and Arvid Lindblad has proved to be a stellar combination, with a vacancy at the team only looking likely if Max Verstappen decides to leave Red Bull at the end of the season. <\/p>\n

Amid this, Tsolov is squarely focused on his F2 campaign, adamant about blocking out all the \u201cnoise\u201d that could get him into serious \u201ctrouble\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously I try to distance myself from it, isolate a little bit,\u201d he told F1.com.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe noise can really get you into trouble. But honestly I\u2019ve been handling it pretty well, because it\u2019s not something I necessarily didn\u2019t expect to happen.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t expect it to be such a big boom, but it is what it is, and I\u2019ll just keep doing what I\u2019ve been doing until now.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously the season we are achieving right now is great and I think there is more to come as well, I think there is more we can show.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TsolovTsolov is the current F2 championship leader<\/p>\n

Nikola Tsolov reveals extent of Red Bull F1 race seat talks <\/p>\n

Tsolov signed up to the Red Bull junior programme from Alpine last season. <\/p>\n

The 21-year-old is also scheduled to undertake a TPC test for Racing Bulls at Imola<\/a> later this month to accumulate enough superlicense points for an FP1 outing. <\/p>\n

And if Tsolov manages to win the F2 title, he would have racked up enough points to earn himself an F1 seat in principle. <\/p>\n

That said, Tsolov has revealed that while the rumour mill has already assigned him an F1 race seat, talks with Red Bull are yet to pick up any serious momentum. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re obviously really happy with me, but there\u2019s nothing that has been talked about, nothing clear,\u201d Tsolov revealed. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just keep doing what you\u2019re doing, you\u2019re doing great, but there\u2019s not much more than that to be honest.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously Red Bull themselves have prepared me for all this, what\u2019s happening now and because of their help I\u2019m able to achieve those results as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut we haven\u2019t reached the point where there\u2019s anything more than that, we\u2019re just focusing on F2 right now.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt means a lot to me, obviously it means that people are appreciating and they believe in what I do. I believe in myself as well and I really do feel like this year has been great and I should deserve a chance.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut things are never certain in this sport, so it\u2019s all about taking every opportunity I get from now on and focus on F2, because that\u2019s the only thing that can really help me progress up the ladder.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next up for Tsolov in his charge for the F2 drivers\u2019 title is the Temple of Speed: Monza. <\/p>\n

READ MORE \u2013 Nikola Tsolov \u2018on the radar\u2019 of Racing Bulls over potential F1 role<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"F2 Championship Leader Nikola Tsolov has been named \u201cnext in line\u201d to make his Formula 1 debut as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":859905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,206381,62050,15196,85],"class_list":["post-859904","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-nikola-tsolov","tag-racingbulls","tag-redbull","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859904","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=859904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/859905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=859904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=859904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=859904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}