Hadjar in the frame as Ralf Schumacher slams Tsunoda’s Red Bull prospects
Red Bull’s mid-season gamble is running out of road. Yuki Tsunoda, promoted to partner Max Verstappen in round three, hasn’t turned the RB21 into the two-car points machine the team hoped for — and Ralf Schumacher doesn’t think he’ll be on the Formula 1 grid next season at all.
“Definitely not,” Schumacher said when asked if Tsunoda will be racing next year, calling the Japanese driver “lucky” to still be in the seat through the end of the season. It’s a brutal verdict, but it mirrors the paddock mood after a bruising run in which Verstappen has again shouldered almost the entire scoring burden while Red Bull fights to keep its Constructors’ ambitions alive.
This was never the plan. When Red Bull pulled the trigger at the Japanese Grand Prix — replacing the under-fire Liam Lawson and elevating Tsunoda from the sister team — Christian Horner sold it as a calculated sporting decision. They needed a known quantity, a driver who could help drag the RB21 into a better operating window while snagging solid points on Sundays. Tsunoda’s experience and feel, the logic went, would accelerate the car’s development.
The reality has been far less tidy. Tsunoda’s return has yielded little more than a handful of points and a lot of questions. The car remains temperamental, Verstappen is doing Verstappen things, and the Constructors’ table tells a story that’s far too reliant on one side of the garage.
Cue the rising drumbeat for Isack Hadjar. The Racing Bulls rookie launched himself into the conversation with a surprise podium at Zandvoort, hustling the VCARB02 to third behind Verstappen on a day that rewarded precision and nerve. It wasn’t a fluke; it was a statement, the sort of moment Red Bull’s talent pipeline exists to produce.
Hadjar is now widely tipped as the frontrunner to partner Verstappen next year — potentially the Dutchman’s seventh teammate in a Red Bull car, and the latest product of a programme that’s both ruthless and relentlessly effective. Schumacher, who knows a thing or two about the pressure cooker at this level, offered a mixed warning.
He’d initially advise against taking the seat, he admitted with a laugh, because dropping a young driver into Verstappen’s orbit is seldom a gentle introduction. The car, he argued, has been sculpted around Max’s driving virtues, and if Tsunoda can’t live with it, why would a rookie? “Red Bull would have destroyed him too,” Schumacher said of Hadjar — this year.
But next year, he added, resets the board. With Red Bull pursuing a fresh concept for the new season, there’s a chance to start level. “Max starts from scratch, his new teammate starts from scratch,” Schumacher said. In that scenario, he reckons Hadjar has the raw speed and adaptability to make sense as the “simplest, most obvious” pick alongside the reigning benchmark.
It’s the classic Red Bull dilemma distilled into one decision. Stick or twist? Red Bull wanted Tsunoda’s steadiness and set-up savvy; it got inconsistency and little relief for Verstappen. Hadjar offers upside and momentum, but also risk. Put him in next year and you could unlock something exciting. Or you could feed another promising youngster into the woodchipper.
There’s a human layer to this too. Tsunoda has waited years for this chance and — politics aside — he earned it. He’s also frank enough to admit when a weekend’s gone wrong, and there have been too many of those. If he’s to change the narrative, he needs a couple of proper results before season’s end, the kind that shift the conversation from “what went wrong?” to “maybe there’s something here.”
Red Bull, meanwhile, won’t wait forever. They rarely do. Whether it’s a ruthless call or a romantic one, the decision will speak volumes about how they see 2026 coming at them, and how badly they want two cars in the fight right now. If Tsunoda’s form doesn’t spike, Hadjar’s phone will keep ringing.
For what it’s worth, Hadjar doesn’t look fazed. Zandvoort showed he’s got more than speed; he’s got racecraft, and the temperament to manage a messy Grand Prix without blinking. That plays well at Milton Keynes, where the driver on the other side of the garage is the toughest yardstick in the business.
The subtext here is simple. Red Bull can’t afford another year of one-man heroics. Verstappen will always deliver, but titles are won with depth — and that means someone, somewhere, has to start sticking it on the board every Sunday. Whether that’s Tsunoda finding late-season rhythm or Hadjar getting the nod, the message is clear.
Time to pick a lane.
