The Red Bull Junior Program is known for developing some of the best racing talent in the world. Youngsters, under the Red Bull banner, compete in several racing disciplines all over the world, with most of them hoping to make it to F1 someday. Leading the program at the Milton Keynes-based team is Guillaume “Rocky” Rocquelin, Sebastian Vettel’s former race engineer.
On the Talking Bulls podcast, junior and reserve driver Liam Lawson shared insights into Rocky’s work preparing young drivers for the competitive world of motorsport. According to Lawson, Rocky assigns “written homework” to the drivers, which he later evaluates, ensuring they are fully ready.
Lawson, who also did these assignments, explained that it was to ensure drivers gained an understanding of the fundamental engineering side of the cars they were driving. The homework was basically a set of questions, which made the juniors research about specific parts and areas of the car, and how they actually worked.
Lawson revealed that there were other graded tests, which focused around diet and the health of driver as athletes. He explained, The core of it is mostly technical. But a lot of it is just basic rules of how you look after yourselves. You know, sleep, nutrition [and] things like that.”
Lawson recalled that his go-to hot beverage was oat milk. Rocky made him research its nutritional value compared to regular milk. This made him realize that what he was drinking wasn’t significantly better. Amusingly, Lawson admitted that he still prefers oat milk anyway.
Red Bull’s methods of training up their academy drivers might come off as unconventional for some. However, it cannot be argued that they bear results. Over the years, the Austrian team has developed some of the best F1 drivers on the grid, and nurtured multiple-time World champions like Max Verstappen and Vettel. Other top stars to come out of its junior program included Alex Albon and Pierre Gasly.
