Red Bull Sprint Qualifying Blunder Shocks Tsunoda

Tsunoda Furious as Red Bull Blunder Costs Him Sprint Qualifying

Yuki Tsunoda didn’t hold back after a timing mistake by Red Bull Racing left him stranded in SQ1 during Sprint Qualifying in Austin.

“It’s pretty shocking,” Tsunoda told F1TV, clearly frustrated with his team.

The Japanese driver found himself in a race against the clock as SQ1 wound down. He needed to put in a competitive lap time but never got the chance.

Between refueling his RB21 and the typical chaos of drivers trying to create gaps for clean laps, Red Bull miscalculated their timing window completely.

“The timing of the garage exit was not even close,” Tsunoda explained. “I don’t know what’s happened there, to be honest. Something went wrong and we didn’t have any opportunity to do a laptime, so it was a shame.”

What made it worse? Tsunoda felt completely powerless in the situation.

“Very frustrating. It’s not a thing I can control, to be honest, or we can control. But it was more up to them than myself, managing the timing.”

Red Bull team principal Laurent Mekies quickly took responsibility after the session.

“We got it wrong, we apologise to Yuki,” Mekies admitted. “The programme was a bit too tight, it was a choice between staying out and cooling down on track or trying to cool down a bit better in the garage.”

The team thought they had enough time for Tsunoda to exit the garage again, but they miscalculated badly.

“We thought we’d have time to get out of garage and back out again, but it was only possible for two cars to do that, but we missed the cut,” Mekies explained. “We owe Yuki and apologise there.”

This mistake means Tsunoda will start near the back of the grid for the Sprint race, putting him at a serious disadvantage for the weekend.

For a team known for their strategic excellence, this rare operational error comes at a time when every point matters in the constructors’ championship battle.

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