Daniel Ricciardo sustained an injury on his wrist during the latest race weekend at Zandvoort, which compelled AlphaTauri to find a replacement driver. Liam Lawson, the Red Bull junior driver was called up for duty even though a far more experienced Nyck de Vries was in contention until the last minute. Now, F1 expert Christian Menath revealed the reason behind de Vries being snubbed in favor of Lawson, in the F1 Nation podcast.
Ricciardo sustained some serious injuries to his arm and is expected to be out for weeks. Even though such injuries take 12-14 weeks to recover in a normal human being, Ricciardo is aiming to make his recovery in time for the Singapore GP in three weeks’ time.
🚨 OFFICIAL : Liam Lawson will drive for AlphaTauri at Monza and for any subsequent races where Daniel would not be present due to his recovery time#F1 #ItalianGP pic.twitter.com/xxH5A1gAMj
— RBR Daily (@RBR_Daily) August 28, 2023
As revealed by Christian Horner recently, the Australian would look to return ahead of the race in Singapore. However, there’s still doubt if he can manage to do that given the track is very physically demanding. If that is the case, Lawson could very well get to compete in three races this season.
F1 expert reveals why Red Bull picked Lawson over Nyck de Vries to replace Daniel Ricciardo
During the podcast, Menath, a Motorsport Magazin journalist opened up on why AlphaTauri went for a less experienced Lawson over de Vries. He said that due to the longevity of the return, de Vries was not called up to the team.
Talking about this, he said, “I think if Daniel wouldn’t have had a major injury, then they would have probably put de Vries in the car. If they would have known it’s just that one race because de Vries knows the car, he probably knows the track a bit better.”
name a guy who will be driving his second f1 race in Monza 🇳🇿👇#ItalianGP pic.twitter.com/ljQ3d5Srsn
— Scuderia AlphaTauri (@AlphaTauriF1) August 29, 2023
However, Lawson somewhat impressed the top bosses with his performance even though there were no huge expectations from him. This comes even though he didn’t have any preparation time whatsoever.
Liam Lawson fulfilled his AlphaTauri duty
Liam Lawson was called up to replace Daniel Ricciardo at the very last minute. The young driver from New Zealand had just one free practice before he had to suit up for qualifying on Saturday.
The 21-year-old qualified in P19, but finished in a much better position in P13, ahead of teammate Yuki Tsunoda. Even though his improvement was caused by the chaos that occurred due to rain, his result showed great promise.
With that said, Lawson now has experience under his belt. He will try to take that experience into the coming race, and push for points in the Italian GP this weekend.
