Three rookies under major pressure in China

Mar.21 (GMM) Three F1 rookies have arrived in China with an awful lot of pressure on their shoulders.

Max Verstappen’s new teammate, Liam Lawson, had a horror weekend in Australia amid both lagging pace and a crash on Sunday.

It prompted McLaren CEO Zak Brown to declare that he thinks Red Bull made a mistake by not putting Yuki Tsunoda in the car instead. “I don’t care what Zak says, to be honest,” the New Zealander said in Shanghai.

“I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to him.”

Former Haas boss Gunther Steiner, however, said he thinks Lawson was “the most disappointing of all the rookies” in Melbourne.

“If things continue like this, I don’t rule out that he will be replaced, especially since Yuki Tsunoda has long dreamed of becoming Max’s teammate.”

It’s all music to Tsunoda’s ears.

“It’s good when people speak highly of me, but I just have to keep doing what I’m doing,” said the Japanese.

Arguably with even more pressure on him than Lawson, meanwhile, is the Alpine rookie Jack Doohan, with rumours still swirling that he could be replaced by Franco Colapinto within mere races.

Team boss Oliver Oakes, however, played down his Melbourne crash. “He wasn’t the only rookie that had that happen to him,” he said. “And it’s not like he did anything crazy.

“Up until that point, he’d had a really good weekend. And he’s had to go through a lot in the last few weeks.”

Oakes also said the current Doohan-Pierre Gasly pairing is working well. “The way they worked together with the engineers is something we haven’t seen here for a while,” he said – a clear dig at Esteban Ocon.

Finally, Isack Hadjar not only didn’t make it to the end of the formation lap in Melbourne, he was then slammed by his boss Dr Helmut Marko for his “embarrassing” display of tears.

“I mean, I found it embarrassing myself,” the 20-year-old French-Algerian driver admitted.

“And, you know, I had Helmut on the phone a day later, and it’s all good. I know how he works,” the Racing Bulls rookie added. “I also think he said it in German and it was reinterpreted differently.”