‘We had the potential to be right up there’ – Lawson gives his take on ‘interesting’ first day back at Red Bull in Zandvoort

Liam Lawson has given his take on how his “interesting” first day back at the wheel of a Red Bull went, with the New Zealander admitting that his SQ2 exit in Sprint Qualifying was “frustrating” after displaying good potential earlier in the session.

It was confirmed on Wednesday that Lawson would substitute for Isack Hadjar in Zandvoort due to the Frenchman sustaining a wrist injury – marking a return to Red Bull for Lawson following the 24-year-old’s brief two-race stint with the squad at the start of 2025 – while Yuki Tsunoda would fill Lawson’s spot at Racing Bulls.

Despite having little time to adapt to his new car, Lawson acquitted himself well during the opening stages of Sprint Qualifying and even outpaced Max Verstappen in SQ1. His run subsequently came to an end, however, when he suffered an SQ2 exit, putting him in P11 for Saturday’s Sprint.

Pushed afterwards on whether he felt frustrated at not progressing to SQ3 given his decent showing, Lawson responded: “Yeah. Honestly, I don’t really know. Obviously it’s been an interesting day.

“Normally, you sort of improve through Quali, and we started SQ1 quite strong, then we didn’t make the same step that everybody else did. We’ll look into it.

“There’s a lot, obviously, to learn today. So far, honestly, I feel quite good in the car. I was honestly feeling okay through Quali, I thought we’d get through, so it’s a shame.”

Having appeared to settle quickly, Lawson was also quizzed on whether this bodes well for what might be possible across the rest of the weekend.

“It definitely does,” he answered. “We’ll obviously try and fix it and put it together for Quali, but we definitely had the potential to be right up there today, so it’s frustrating.”

Lawson finds himself sandwiched between both cars from his usual team – Racing Bulls – on the grid for Saturday’s Sprint, with Arvid Lindblad ahead in 10th while Tsunoda joins Lawson on the sixth row in 12th place.