Honda comes clean on its involvement in Yuki Tsunoda's Red Bull promotion

Honda boss Koji Watanabe has said that the Japanese brand had no hand in Yuki Tsunoda getting promoted to Red Bull and replacing Liam Lawson. In a move that shocked a lot of people, the Austrian team took a call after the race in China to replace the Kiwi driver.

In a direct swap, Lawson was replaced with Tsunoda at the senior team. The seat alongside Max Verstappen at Red Bull has always been contentious. Since Daniel Ricciardo left the team in 2018, multiple drivers have been put in the cockpit, with all of them falling out of favor in due time.

Sergio Perez lost out in 2024 when the Mexican was dropped at the end of the year and replaced by Lawson. The Kiwi had only done a handful of races in 2023 and 2024, and it did appear that he was arguably pushed too early to the senior team.

When the call was made to promote Yuki Tsunoda and swap out Liam Lawson, there were reports that Honda played a role in the final call as well. Talking to Motorsport, the boss of the Japanese power unit supplier denied any such suggestion as he said:

"We don't know when or how Red Bull will make the choices, so we just communicate that they have to choose the best driver," Watanabe said. "I communicate well with Christian Horner and we have constant discussions, not only about which drivers to have, but also about the structures off the track. In this case, we didn't take any special actions."

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Red Bull and Honda splitting in 2026

Koji Watanabe was also quick to point out that the Honda partnership with Red Bull ends at the end of 2025. Beyond this, the Japanese brand holds next to no leverage over the Austrian brand, and hence suggestions of any lobbying were out of line. He said:

"Our partnership with Red Bull ends at the end of the year, so we have no leverage with the team towards 2026. Tsunoda earned the promotion based on his own performance, so he has to continue to prove himself in the coming years. The most important thing is what he wants to do in that. And now that he wants to stay at Red Bull, there is no reason for us to interfere with that."

Yuki Tsunoda's journey as Max Verstappen's teammate begins in Suzuka this weekend. It will be interesting to see how he fares, as he could script an impressive career in the sport. The partnership with Honda began in 2019 and has been very successful for the Austrian team.

The squad first won the title with the supplier in 2021 and has since then not lost the drivers' championship. The partnership comes to an end this season as Honda moves on to Aston Martin.