Yuki Tsunoda goes through how he took up the F1 Japanese GP weekend and things he tried, as he is surprised how Max Verstappen copes with the set-up.
After the departure of Liam Lawson, all eyes were on Tsunoda during the F1 Japanese GP weekend. While Verstappen did his job of taking surprise pole and even victory, his new Red Bull teammate faced familiar problems albeit finished slightly better than others who drove before him.
It was actually going decent for Tsunoda to start the weekend, even though on the inside, he had usual issues of finding the optimum balance. Having had one weekend under his belt, the Japanese driver reflected on how he approached it, in terms of taking the right set-up.
He went at length to discuss about the differences he found from driving the car in the simulator to track and how he had to adjust. Despite the non-scoring situation dictated by one qualifying lapse, Tsunoda felt positive in understanding the car and how things are different from Racing Bulls.
Progress from last weekend –
Tsunoda: “Last week, in terms of our progress, I would say it wasn’t fully success but it was a bit more towards success side, it was better than I expected. There were lots of ups and downs, it is natural because it is still in the process, I am still learning the car, I try lot of set-ups between sessions and it was quite limited time and unfortunately in qualifying, it was just that a new thing came up that I didn’t expect in Q2. In the end, it was not result I wanted but in terms of future learning, I actually came out like that early with new things, it is quite positive for the future.
“So I can avoid it, just because it was my home grand prix, so I wanted more. In terms of how I got on in the car, it’s still OK, it’s too early stages to say I’m able to drive comfortably or not. But I think I’m able to cope with the car balance that most drivers struggle with so far. Actually, we went to Max’s side rather than my set-up, which I thought would be good. Surprisingly, I’m able to drive quite well so I’m happy with it so far.”
Approach situation –
Tsunoda: “It’s a completely different approach. If I say…I feel like VCARB will tell us how to do it, and Red Bull is more like they can adjust it from the out lap from their side. It’s quite a different approach there and I wouldn’t say which is better or not, to be honest. There are a couple of things that feel like VCARB has an easier approach for the driver, more than Red Bull. But I think Max has had that approach for nine years, so he’s just able to naturally do it – same as me at VCARB, I don’t have to think about it. I probably have a little bit of digging to work out what kind of approach I should take, and it’s an ongoing process, how we can do better as a team to make it a little bit easier.”
Simulator and reality –
Tsunoda: “The simulator is more difficult than I expected and the more I do laps – long run for example – that kind of things, a little bit more exaggerated, also depends on the wind direction as well. Also, Max mentioned it as well, it is a bit different than how he feels always on simulator, especially Suzuka, I don’t know, it seems like biggest delta he felt, compared to simulator and real car, so that for me makes sense how I felt in the car because it was quite different, how it felt in simulator because there it felt more comfortable to driving. I was able to make the car less sharp turning in Suzuka, it was like more I felt in VCARB, it felt a lot comfortable in the car and I thought this is a really good direction but in terms of lap time, it went slower.
“But inside the car I felt okay, this lap time must be at least faster than FP1, because then I started with a bit tricky in the rear and I felt like there was a lot more room to improve in terms of confidence and driving and FP2, it was continuous driving better, the car set-up was quite good but I went actually slower. So I think, from the car characteristics, I have to cope with the trickiness. In terms of lap time that trickiness maybe providing lap time, I have to deal with it I guess, but we know these kind of things balance and feature, this also obviously not helping fully with the car performance because I think Max was able to put an amazing lap in qualifying in Suzuka, but I think in terms of performance, we know that we are not the best, that way we will try to sort out at some point.
Verstappen handling –
Tsunoda: “The direction we tried in the simulator, which was a bit different [from] China to focus on calming down the rear, and the set-up we concluded in the end I felt was good. Also, Max felt pretty positive in the simulator, so in the end, also Max started with that direction which I quite liked as well already at Suzuka. I went for a more extreme side in that direction and it just didn’t work out. It’s not like the set-up that Max used in China; China was a bit more specific because it was more front-end limitation. But Max’s set-up helps [the rear] and I think that set-up probably in the simulator I feel definitely the trickiness. It’s incredible how he’s able to cope with that kind of set-up, even in the simulator it felt like…it is not an easy car. As a team we know that, it is not the direction we should take throughout the year, so lets see how it goes.”
Here’s what Yuki Tsunoda said after Japanese GP
Here’s McLaren, Red Bull duo on Japanese GP fight
