Red Bull senior advisor Helmut Marko revealed that Alpha Tauri has hired a sports psychologist to work with Yuki Tsunoda. The Austrian talent scout believes Tsunoda needed some help to calm his radio outbursts.
Speaking about the Japanese driver to ServusTV, Marko said:
“Thank God Max [Verstappen] is calm, our problem child in this respect, not only in this respect, is [Yuki] Tsunoda. He explodes on the radio, you wouldn’t believe it. We have organised a kind of psychologist to work with him, because he continued to complain through the corners, and that affects performance. We should keep our emotions in check.”
Labeling the Japanese driver as a ‘problem child’ in their current driver pool, Marko feels the AlphaTauri driver needs to be calmer with his emotions while driving. The Austrian revealed that Yuki Tsunoda is working with a sports psychologist for the same reason, which often affects his performance and can be heard in his radio outbursts.
Yuki Tsunoda happy to work with his new psychologist
Yuki Tsunoda claimed to be happy to work with his new sports psychologist despite being unsure if it is going to fetch any results. The Japanese driver highlighted that one of the main reasons for his consistency in performance in the F2 season was working with his previous psychologist.
As reported by Sports Illustrated, the AlphaTauri driver commented on the hiring of a new psychologist ahead of the 2022 F1 Austrian GP weekend, saying:
“I was already working with the other psychologist/trainer from Formula Two. I was really happy working with him and also he was part of the reason [I was] able to step up to Formula One. He should be able to help me to develop my performance in Formula Two, consistency. Yeah. I will say they hired a new psychologist/trainer from, I will say, four races before. I don’t know [if] currently it’s working well or not.”
While the 2022 season has been better for the Japanese driver than his 2021 season, the results need to be more consistent. Yuki Tsunoda has currently scored 11 points in the drivers’ championship while his teammate Pierre Gasly has scored 16. Although the difference between the two is less in terms of points, consistent performances will play a key in him retaining his seat on the AlphaTauri team after Gasly was confirmed for another season.