Liam Lawson accused of ‘stealing points from Red Bull’ with aggressive behaviour

Juan Pablo Montoya says he doesn’t know what Liam Lawson is “playing at” as the Kiwi aims to land a seat with a Red Bull team for F1 2025.

With one seat left on the F1 grid for 2025, Liam Lawson is hopeful of securing the VCARB cockpit and has just three races left to impress Red Bull after making his full-time debut at the United States Grand Prix.

Juan Pablo Montoya: Only thing Lawson is doing is stealing Red Bull points

Additional reporting by Pablo Hidalgo

Daniel Ricciardo was dropped from the VCARB driver line-up after the Singapore Grand Prix, in favour of Red Bull dropping reserve driver Liam Lawson into the seat.

Red Bull has a single seat available for next season, with the second VCARB seat alongside Yuki Tsunoda up for grabs, although there is also a possibility of impressing Red Bull to the points of potentially replacing Sergio Perez at the senior team if the Mexican driver’s form continues in the same vein that it has for most of F1 2024.

Lawson thus has a six-race spell to stake his claim for a seat at the Faenza-based squad, and has impressed so far – he’s scored two points finishes from three races, while the only blot on his copybook has been his angry response to a collision with Perez while the pair battled with vigour in the Mexican’s home race.

Showing his middle finger to Perez in the battle, which resulted in damage to both cars, led to some criticism from Red Bull’s Helmut Marko, but the Kiwi apologised for the incident and sought out Christian Horner following the race to do the same behind closed doors.

With three races left in which to impress Red Bull, one man who is not impressed by his approach to his audition is Juan Pablo Montoya. The former Williams and McLaren star, who made a name for himself with an aggressive, take-no-prisoners attitude towards his rivals, questioned how Lawson is setting about his racing.

“In the Sprint race in Brazil, Checo [Perez] did a great job. And in the main race, when he was able to overtake Liam…. Honestly, I don’t know what Liam is playing at,” Montoya told W Radio Colombia.

“I said it in Mexico and I repeat it now. I don’t understand what Liam is playing at.

“I understand that he wants to prove that he is better, that Checo is ‘nobody’ and he is capable of anything, but the only thing Liam is doing is stealing points from Red Bull for the Constructors’ World Championship.

“Checo was very clean and made it easy for Liam, but Liam was tough again.”

More on Red Bull and F1 2025

? What happened next? The nine Red Bull drivers who didn’t land the top seat

? F1 2025 driver line-up: Who is already confirmed for the 2025 grid?

Gabriel Bortoleto over Franco Colapinto a ‘no-brainer’

Montoya also weighed in on the signing by Sauber/Audi of Gabriel Bortoleto, with the Brazilian rookie getting the nod for the seat alongside Nico Hulkenberg.

Franco Colapinto, the Argentinean star, has been strongly linked as a rival to Lawson for a seat with the Red Bull teams, but was also linked with the vacant seat at the Hinwil-based squad.

With that door now shut on Colapinto, Montoya said he fully understood the rationale behind signing Bortoleto despite the promise shown by Colapinto during his short stint in F1 since replacing the struggling Logan Sargeant at Williams.

“‘The Bortoleto thing was logical. We had already talked about it,” he said.

“If you look at what Bortoleto has done in the last two years and what Colapinto has done in the last two years… any boss would choose Bortoleto over Colapinto.

“Colapinto has done a spectacular job in Formula 1. But what he did in F3 and F2 compared to Bortoleto… there is no comparison. To tell you the truth, I don’t think it was a complicated decision. Colapinto was tied to Williams and Williams wanted to keep that link.”

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