{"id":919713,"date":"2026-10-07T18:56:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T18:56:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/919713\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T18:56:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T18:56:09","slug":"racing-bulls-urged-to-retain-best-of-the-rest-amid-f1-2027-driver-uncertainty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/919713\/","title":{"rendered":"Racing Bulls urged to retain ‘best of the rest’ amid F1 2027 driver uncertainty"},"content":{"rendered":"

Racing Bulls<\/a> has been urged to retain Liam Lawson<\/a> for next season as the New Zealander is best of the rest in the standings despite swapping teams for three races when he substituted for Isack Hadjar.<\/p>\n

Racing Bulls remains the only team yet to confirm either of its F1 2027 drivers, with three drivers in contention.<\/p>\n

David Croft urges Racing Bulls to keep Liam Lawson for F1 2027<\/p>\n

While Lawson<\/a> and Arvid Lindblad are the incumbent drivers, Red Bull junior Nikola Tsolov is officially the \u201cnext in line\u201d according to Racing Bulls team principal Alan Permane.<\/p>\n

The Bulgarian sits second in the Formula 2 standings after falling behind Rafael C\u00e2mara at Baku\u2019s triple-header weekend.<\/p>\n

Red Bull and Racing Bulls have yet to make a decision.<\/p>\n

According to speculation, it is Lawson\u2019s seat that is potentially on the line despite the New Zealander scoring the bulk of the team\u2019s 90 points.<\/p>\n

And he\u2019s done so despite stepping out of the car for three races when he switched to Red Bull to fill in for the injured Hadjar.<\/p>\n

His 51 points with Racing Bulls, added to his 14 with Red Bull, have put Lawson\u2019s best of the rest in ninth place in the Drivers\u2019 standings, top among those outside the top four teams on the grid.<\/p>\n

Sky pundit David Croft believes that should be enough to secure his place on the F1 grid with Racing Bulls.<\/p>\n

\u201cRacing Bulls shouldn\u2019t change their driver line-up for next year,\u201d Croft told Sky Sports\u2019 The F1 Show. \u201cThey should keep it exactly as it is.<\/p>\n

\u201c[He\u2019s the] best of the rest, even though he did drive for one of the top four teams for a couple of races and did a decent job standing in.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiam was, I think, promoted up to Red Bull too soon and was jettisoned back down again as a result.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the way he\u2019s cleared his mind. He\u2019s forgotten all about the start of last year and is a properly good racer.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the speculation about Lawson\u2019s future continues, it is dividing pundits with Ralf Schumacher saying the team should drop him for Tsolov.<\/p>\n

Go deeper: Liam Lawson\u2019s Racing Bulls contract<\/p>\n

F1 driver contracts: What is the contract status of every driver on the F1 2026 grid?<\/a><\/p>\n

The four drivers potentially out of contract at the end of F1 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think he\u2019ll stay<\/a>,\u201d the six-time Grand Prix winner told Sky Sports Deutschland. I believe Arvid Lindblad will stay, and that they\u2019ll give Tsolov a chance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking to PlanetF1.com and other accredited media at the Bahrain Grand Prix, Lawson concedes all he can do is focus on putting in the best performances possible while the talks go in the background.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are conversations obviously constantly being had in the background, but for me, it\u2019s very much focused on the racing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t feel like there\u2019s much more I could have done this year. We\u2019ve had a good season and, at the moment, in a good place in the championship, and that\u2019s where I\u2019m trying to stay.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the moment, try and stay in ninth and keep those points rolling in, and those decisions I\u2019m sure will be made in the next few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher<\/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:\u00a0What Horner told Brundle about Ferrari team principal speculation<\/a><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Racing Bulls has been urged to retain Liam Lawson for next season as the New Zealander is best…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":919714,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,818,3352,44,9107,85],"class_list":["post-919713","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-racing-bulls","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919713","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=919713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/919714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=919713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=919713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=919713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}