{"id":118331,"date":"2025-09-06T09:38:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T09:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/118331\/"},"modified":"2025-09-06T09:38:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T09:38:07","slug":"we-do-not-plan-to-change-during-the-season-laurent-mekies-insists-red-bull-will-not-swap-yuki-tsunoda-for-isack-hadjar-in-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/118331\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;We do not plan to change during the season&#8217; \u2013 Laurent Mekies insists Red Bull will not swap Yuki Tsunoda for Isack Hadjar in 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">Red Bull Team Principal Laurent Mekies has confirmed that there are no plans to replace Yuki Tsunoda with Isack Hadjar before the end of the 2025 season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\"><a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/drivers\/isack-hadjar\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Hadjar<\/a> became the latest first-time podium finisher during the Dutch Grand Prix last weekend having qualified an impressive fourth and benefitting from Lando Norris&#8217; late retirement to finish third.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">The <a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/teams\/racing-bulls\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Racing Bulls<\/a> driver has impressed during his maiden campaign with his speed and race results, which culminated last weekend in becoming the youngest Frenchman to take a Formula 1 rostrum.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">Even before last weekend, speculation was growing that Hadjar would be promoted to the <a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/teams\/red-bull-racing\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Red Bull<\/a> team sooner rather than later, the 20-year-old stating before the Canadian Grand Prix back in June that <a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/latest\/article\/hadjar-very-curious-to-see-what-he-can-do-in-a-red-bull-but-admits-call-up.2htlaGWuLdpt5eBmBbwzQs\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">&#8220;I wouldn\u2019t feel ready&#8221;<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\"><a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/drivers\/yuki-tsunoda\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Tsunoda<\/a> himself was already moved to the Red Bull team from Racing Bulls in place of the underperforming <a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/drivers\/liam-lawson\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Liam Lawson<\/a>, the pair swapping places after just two races of the current campaign.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">However, the 25-year-old has endured a difficult time since joining the senior squad, claiming just four points finishes in 14 Grands Prix, although the Japanese driver ended a run of seven races without scoring last weekend with his P9 in Zandvoort.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">Despite struggling to match team mate Max Verstappen, Tsunoda&#8217;s place with the team seems secure for the remaining nine Grands Prix.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">&#8220;I think the short answer is yes,&#8221; said Team Principal Mekies when asked on Friday ahead of the Italian Grand Prix whether Hadjar would remain with Racing Bulls until the end of the season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">&#8220;I think we made it clear, very public, we have time with our driver decision. We have enough drivers in the driver programme to cover quite a few scenarios for next year. We don&#8217;t have a reason to rush.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">&#8220;No, we do not plan to change during the season. Yuki has been making a good step in the last three races, we want more, but he&#8217;s doing a good job. First time in the points after seven races, best Qualifying with the team at Spa, he&#8217;s on a positive trend.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">&#8220;It&#8217;s extremely nice to watch Isack&#8217;s progress and to see him performing at the level he did in the last race. [It] was a fantastic demonstration of the progress he has been doing during the season but we are relaxed about the driver topic, we have all the cards on the Red Bull side.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Red Bull Team Principal Laurent Mekies has confirmed that there are no plans to replace Yuki Tsunoda with&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118332,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[1687,372,6537,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-118331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-f1","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118331\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}