Liam Lawson admits incident-strewn Mexico GP “not ideal” for Red Bull promotion

Liam Lawson has confessed that his F1 Mexico City Grand Prix performance was “not ideal” for claiming the Red Bull drive.

Lawson is hotly rumoured to replace Sergio Perez as the teammate of Max Verstappen in 2025.

But the young RB driver’s first two races since replacing Daniel Ricciardo have had plenty of incident.

A week after annoying Fernando Alonso in Texas, Lawson came to blows with Perez and Franco Colapinto in Mexico.

Lawson qualified 12th and finished 16th in Mexico - then batted away questions about a move to Red Bull.

“No, at this stage I don’t know anything further on my future,” he told Sky Sports.

“A race like today is not ideal for that.

“I am focused on the next few races to recover, and score points for the team. We lost points to Haas today.

“After a weekend like this, I’m not thinking about that.”

Lawson’s most notable skirmish in Mexico was awkwardly with Perez, the driver whose F1 career he could feasibly end if he lands a promotion from RB into Red Bull.

Lawson did damage to Perez’s sidepod at Turn 4 on Lap 19, which drew criticism from the more experienced driver.

Perez lambasted Lawson and not having “the right attitude”.

But Lawson also clipped the Williams of Colapinto.

“Honestly, I gave him space at Turn 2,” Lawson explained.

“He carried more speed than I expected.

“I tried to get out of it, but just caught his rear wheel. It’s not really his fault, it’s just a clumsy incident.”

Ultimately Lawson was restricted to a result which won’t have immediately grabbed the headlines he dreamed of.

“I think our pace was strong but we spent the whole race behind another car,” he said.

“We had a brief few laps in clean air, at the start, which we maximised by moving forwards.

“But unfortunately we couldn’t overtake. We had the pace to score points, but the wrong track position.”