Red Bull F1 2025 seat contenders ANALYSED as Perez, Ricciardo and Lawson face showdown

Red Bull took the Formula 1 paddock, press, and fans worldwide by surprise when they confirmed that Sergio Perez would keep his race seat until at least the end of the 2024 season.

The Milton Keynes-based squad faced an enormous decision over who piloted its second car alongside Max Verstappen for the final ten races of the 2024 season, which over the past few rounds has turned from a straightforward romp to both the drivers’ and constructors’ titles into a genuine fight with those behind.

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With McLaren arguably now the fastest team on the grid and Mercedes finding their way back into race-winning form, Red Bull’s advantage in both championships is being hampered by the consistently woeful performances of Perez, who has scored a measly 20 points in the last seven grands prix.

Speculation was rife that, having agreed a contract extension with Perez only a couple of months ago, Red Bull were on the verge of conducting an embarrassing U-turn by dropping him mid-season and replacing him with a different driver from the team’s stable.

Indeed, junior team RB ran a filming day at the Imola circuit last week featuring both current race driver Daniel Ricciardo and reserve driver Liam Lawson in what was widely believed to be a shootout for Perez’s seat.

Instead, it seems that run was part of Red Bull's preparations for 2025, with advisor Helmut Marko suggesting that the line-ups at both Red Bull and RB could be shuffled for next season.

With Perez still in place for the foreseeable future, three other drivers in contention internally, and looking elsewhere also a possibility, how do Red Bull's options for 2025 currently shape up? GPFans has assessed below.

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Should Sergio Perez keep his Red Bull seat?

Perez is enduring what is quite simply one of the most disappointing seasons of any driver competing for a top team in decades. The consistently quick race pace and expert tyre management which defined his career before joining Red Bull have been replaced by almost constant errors, dreadful qualifying speed and a chronic lack of self-belief which has worsened as 2024 has continued.

Starting in second place at Spa last weekend after an exceptionally rare positive qualifying session in the damp, Perez dropped back to eighth by the time the chequered flag fell, comfortably behind Verstappen who himself had started a lowly 11th thanks to an engine penalty.

Perez is now costing Red Bull in both championships on a weekly basis. His lack of points means McLaren are consistently closing the gap in the constructors’ standings, while his horrible Saturdays are leaving Verstappen alone out front and restricting his strategy options as he looks to hold off the challenge of Norris in the fight for the drivers’ title.

A combination of dismay and bemusement have marked Perez’s expression after almost every race weekend this season, and at 34 there is no use in demoting him to a junior team.

Perez is by no means a bad driver - he has demonstrated more than often enough throughout his career that he is quick and competent.

But, unfortunately, unless he is able to rediscover some of the self-belief which has drained from him over recent months, his relationship with Red Bull could end earlier than either side anticipated when that contract renewal was agreed not too long ago.

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Will Liam Lawson be promoted to F1?

22-year-old Lawson impressed when he stepped in for the injured Ricciardo at RB for five rounds last season, scoring two points at the Singapore Grand Prix in one of the most physically demanding races on the F1 calendar.

Red Bull’s refusal to promote him into a race seat at the start of 2024 has apparently caught the attention of Sauber/Audi, who have been linked with signing the Kiwi alongside Nico Hulkenberg for 2025. The interest of a rival team means Red Bull should really now give Lawson the race seat his performances have earned – the question is whether it should be alongside Verstappen or with RB.

When Red Bull promoted Alex Albon from RB in place of Pierre Gasly in 2019, they hung the Thai out to dry by putting him into a brand new car mid-season against one of the fastest drivers of all time when he was still in the early stages of his career. Albon never found his feet and was dropped to the reserve driver role for 2021 before moving to Williams.

Gasly himself had spent the first half of 2019 floundering alongside Verstappen, despite having undertaken a full season of preparation with the junior team during the prior season.

Though Lawson is clearly very talented, putting him alongside Verstappen after just five races as a stand-in for the junior team could well be too much of a burden and risk a repeat of a negative situation Red Bull have caused themselves before. And whether he would be able to qualify high enough to help Verstappen strategically from the get-go is perhaps unlikely.

A full-time stint at RB would allow him more space and time to develop and perhaps represent the smartest long-term decision for Red Bull, then.

Could Yuki Tsunoda drive for Red Bull?

Despite scoring just under double the amount of points Ricciardo has mustered so far this season, Tsunoda does not seem to be in contention for a promotion to Red Bull, and was hardly even discussed by the team in public when they were deliberating over Perez’s new deal in the spring.

The Japanese driver has made marked improvements throughout his time in F1, learning to team his natural speed with smarter decision-making and reigning in the volatile temperament which marred his debut campaign. His outscoring of a seasoned veteran and race winner on the other side of the garage in the past 12 months is a testament to his growing maturity and team leadership skills.

But, Tsunoda does retain a tendency to make occasional errors during races, and whether he is downright quick enough to truly give Red Bull a two-pronged attack in what seems certain to be a highly competitive 2025 season remains to be seen. Clearly, for whatever reason, the team doesn’t believe the 24-year-old is up to it so far.

Another year of leading the RB squad alongside Lawson, focusing on ironing out his errors and continuing to improve his consistency, would be no bad thing for Tsunoda from a personal development point of view given he remains very young. What’s more, that young pairing would reaffirm RB’s position as a junior team focused on developing drivers for the future, a function which has been compromised by Ricciardo’s presence.

But, if Red Bull are not willing to promote Tsunoda for 2025, then surely it will never do so.

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Is Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull’s smartest bet?

There is no use in Ricciardo racing for RB beyond 2024. Not only is he being outperformed by his team-mate, but he is hardly at the stage of his career where he is being developed for the long-term future. With that in mind, it makes most sense to either cut ties completely come the season finale, or trust his experience racing at the front with the Red Bull to give him a second shot.

Has Ricciardo done anywhere near enough at McLaren and latterly RB to justify a return to the seat he left behind at the end of 2018? Absolutely not. His form has steadily worsened and he has come up short against far less experienced team-mates. It is highly unlikely he will ever recapture the level of performance in the mid-2010s which suggested he could one day challenge for the championship.

But his knowledge of the team and experience of running at the front of the field gives him a significant advantage over Tsunoda if Red Bull are treating 2025 as a one-season run at both championships.

Given Ricciardo's age and the fact he has already driven alongside Verstappen, he is the least likely of the three to be overawed by a sudden switch to the big time.

In truth, though, dumping Perez in order to replace him with Ricciardo would be a case of Red Bull swapping one older driver whose results are becoming increasingly disappointing for another.

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Who should Red Bull hire for 2025?

What is clear is that none of Red Bull's four in-house options represents anything like a safe bet. All come with significant drawbacks and none are on anything like the level that Verstappen is.

In fact, Verstappen's ludicrous speed and status within the team renders perhaps the most promising long-term decision - promoting Lawson straight to the top - a tough choice to make given what has happened to Gasly and Albon once they became the Dutchman's team-mate.

Possessing a triple-world champion driver whose ludicrous level of talent renders selecting a team-mate is a nice problem to have, sure, but a problem it remains.

Ultimately, Perez still owns that second cockpit for at least ten more races and has a contract for next year already inked. The power to make sure those things remain the case rests in his hands between now and the end of the season.

It seems almost impossible right now, but if he can reset himself over the summer, and come back with enough confidence, control and cooperation to prove an effective foil for Verstappen's title challenge, then he may just about be able to make himself a more viable option than Tsunoda, Lawson or Ricciardo.

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