Yuki Tsunoda makes punchy ‘I can beat’ Max Verstappen claim

Yuki Tsunoda believes he can beat Red Bull F1 teammate Max Verstappen once he has unlocked everything from his car.

Following his shock Red Bull promotion just two races into the 2025 F1 season as a replacement for the struggling Liam Lawson, Tsunoda has been getting to grips with the tricky-to-drive RB21.

Having endured a disappointing debut on home soil in Japan, Tsunoda felt he made encouraging progress with Red Bull’s car as he reached Q3 and scored his first points for the team with a ninth-place finish in Bahrain.

And it appears Tsunoda isn’t afraid to set himself bold targets, having declared he can “probably beat” Verstappen once he unlocks all he needs from the 2025 Red Bull.

“It’s my first time driving a completely different car,” Tsunoda told media including Motorsport Week in Jeddah.

“I only drove with VCARB for the last four years, so it’s the first time I drove a completely different team’s car.

“I’m trying to use that, and I know that if I unlock that area, I would be able to probably beat him.

“I know myself that I can’t beat him straight away, so I’m just trying to build a good baseline and wait for the moment that I can be in the shape, yeah.”

What Yuki Tsunoda is learning from Max Verstappen

Tsunoda said he is paying close attention to how Verstappen operates as he continues his adaptation at the Red Bull senior team.

“I'm just trying to understand how this car operates, how this car performs well. I think I'm not really understanding even half of it,” he said.

“These things are the key that I'm trying to work really hard on to understand as soon as possible, so I can work on different sort of stuff - all sorts of development and whatever.

“So far, I'm able to kind of put it all together in the qualifying and the race, but also at the same time it's quite up and down. There's a bit of up and down from FP1 to FP3. So I just want to be more consistent throughout.”

Tsunoda added:“I knew how Max builds throughout the week, builds the confidence throughout the week, compared to how I build the confidence throughout the week.

“It’s completely different because he already has massive confidence in this car. So I just make it separate and try to nail it down in qualifying.”