Honda steadies the ship: Tsunoda to see out Red Bull season as Marko delays 2026 call
Honda has moved to calm Red Bull’s driver storm, insisting Yuki Tsunoda will finish the season in the senior team despite a surge in pressure from within the family.
The timing’s not accidental. In the wake of Isack Hadjar’s breakout weekend at Zandvoort — fourth on the grid, third at the flag, Racing Bulls’ first podium under their current name — Helmut Marko has pushed Red Bull’s 2026 driver decision back to October. The advisor wants “a few more races to observe” before locking the puzzle pieces in place. Translation: the audition is still very much live.
That extension is significant for Tsunoda. Drafted into the RB21 as an early-season replacement for Liam Lawson, he’s struggled to turn Saturday flashes into Sunday points. A ninth place in the Netherlands stopped an unwanted run, but it was Hadjar’s podium two garages down that drew the camera lenses and sharpened the internal debate.
Marko’s line out of Zandvoort was telling. “We’ve extended the options… so, around September or October, we want to have a few more races to observe, and then we’ll make the decisions,” he told Sky Deutschland. For a program that’s never been squeamish about mid-season pivots, Honda’s insistence that Tsunoda will see out the year at Red Bull is a notable show of backing — and a useful bit of breathing space for a driver who thrives when the walls stop closing in.
There’s a lot riding on these next races. Red Bull is the only operation running two F1 teams, which turns any choice into a four-seat game of musical chairs across the senior squad and Racing Bulls. For 2026, the only completely fixed point remains Max Verstappen. Everything else is in pencil, and every strong weekend tilts the table.
Hadjar’s result at Zandvoort inevitably re-frames the conversation. The Frenchman didn’t just snag a podium; he did it the hard way after a clean, controlled drive from row two. He’s been building quietly, and then suddenly he wasn’t quiet at all. That carries weight in a system designed to reward a young driver grabbing the moment with both hands.
Tsunoda, to his credit, hasn’t flinched in public. Privately, he knows the brief: fewer scrappy Sundays, more points on the board, and keep the development dialogue productive. He’s talked up recent upgrades on the RB21 and believes they’ve given him something more predictable to lean on. In his words, the difference “before and after” is stark enough to earn him time. He also knows Marko’s style by now — brutally straight, all about the team’s points haul — and accepts the terms of the test: produce, or be part of the reshuffle.
The wider paddock noise is exactly what you’d expect. There’s speculation that the final configuration could feature Verstappen alongside Hadjar at Red Bull, with an in-form junior like Arvid Lindblad stepping up to join Lawson at Racing Bulls. That scenario leaves Tsunoda in the cold. It’s not the only version of events, but it’s one Red Bull can make happen in a heartbeat if the data points head that way between now and the autumn flyaways.
What Honda’s intervention does is remove one dramatic subplot: there will be no mid-season swap in the senior car. That matters. It gives Tsunoda a clear runway to make his case properly. And it resets the tone a fraction inside a garage that’s been short on easy Sundays this year.
For Red Bull, this is typical brinkmanship. Extend the window, keep everyone hungry, make the call late. It’s how they’ve always separated potential from production. For Tsunoda, it’s simple: score relentlessly, tidy up the execution, and take the oxygen away from the Hadjar narrative. For Hadjar, it’s just as clear: keep doing exactly what he did at Zandvoort and the rest will look after itself.
One certainty: the next handful of races will do more to decide Red Bull’s 2026 shape than any meeting in Milton Keynes. With the decision now pencilled for October, Tsunoda has his mandate and his deadline. The fight’s on — and for once, the calendar might be his friend.
