Yuki Tsunoda’s meteoric rise to F1 comes at a puzzling time for Japanese involvement in the sport following Honda’s withdrawal at the end of the 2021 season.
AlphaTauri have signed one of the hottest prospects in the junior categories after a stellar rookie season in Formula 2 with Carlin saw Tsunoda finish third in the Driver’s Standings.
Red Bull’s junior programme has taken a battering in recent seasons following the unsuccessful stints of Pierre Gasly and Alexander Albon, but both Honda and Red Bull have significantly invested in the 20-year-old. Here is an overview of Tsunoda’s route to F1 and what to look out for in his rookie season:
2016-18: F4 Japanese Championship
Yuki contested three years in Japanese Formula 4. He only took part in two races in 2016, but even at 15 years old, Yuki still managed to score a podium that season. His first full season in 2017 saw Tsunoda drive for the Honda Formula Dream Project Team, notching up three wins and six podiums in 14 races to finish third in the Championship. Yuki’s breakout year came in 2018 where he won the Championship, winning half of the races contested and scoring a further four podiums.
2019: FIA Formula 3 Championship
Yuki’s first season in Europe saw him contest the rebranded FIA Formula 3 Championship (previously GP3 Series) with the Swiss outfit, Jenzer. The team have largely found their success in regional championships such as Italian F4.
Having been part of the GP3 series since its debut in 2010, Jenzer had a team best third-place finish in 2010 and 2017 – with Nico Müller’s finish in 2010 their best driver performance to date. Despite racing on tracks that he had never visited, Yuki looked at home in the series.
The 2019, the F3 season was dominated by the Prema drivers of Robert Schwartzman, Marcus Armstrong and Jehan Daruvala, between them winning eight of the 16 races. Tsunoda was one of only five non-Prema drivers to top the podium that season. The first half of the season for Yuki was solid, a 10th place finish on his F3 debut in the Feature Race at Barcelona was followed by seventh in the Feature Race in Paul-Ricard. Those were his only two points finishes in the opening three rounds.
The Sprint Race at Silverstone (Round 4) changed the course of Tsunoda’s season and arguably his career. The 18-year-old scored points in the next seven races, including a trio of podiums. The highlight of which was a third and first at the Italian Feature and Sprint races, both his best results in these disciplines. The weekend at Monza, in particular, demonstrated Yuki’s speed, maturity and his greatest skill: one-lap pace.
Tsunoda finishes ninth overall in a highly talented field with 67 points, more staggering is that he scored Jenzer’s entire points haul that season. His second half of the season form was enough to secure promotion to the FIA Formula 2 Championship for 2020.
2020: FIA Formula 2 Championship
Yuki’s exploits in F3 saw the Japanese driver join Carlin, the team that guided Lando Norris to second in the Championship in 2018.
His first weekend didn’t start well with 18th and 11th place finishes in Austria. In the second round, Yuki looked like a completely different driver. Tsunoda put his Carlin on pole in monsoon-like conditions at Spielberg and dominated the Feature Race until his team mucked up his pitstop. He came home in second but couldn’t hide his disappointment on the podium. He came away from the second Austrian weekend with 23 points owing to the pole position also scoring the fastest lap of the Feature Race.
Tsunoda had a write-off weekend in Hungary but fared much better at the Silverstone doubleheader. On the first weekend, he finished third in the Feature Race and retired in the Sprint Race. At the second Silverstone weekend, Yuki finished sixth in the Feature and won the Sprint race after the Prema duo of Robert Schwartzman and Mick Schumacher collided at Brooklands. With these results, Yuki was creeping into Championship contention.
Tsunoda took a further two Feature Race victories at Spa and the Sakhir Outer Loop and a second place at Sochi to finish third in the Championship. The final weekend in Bahrain also saw Yuki narrowly miss joining an elite club alongside the likes of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg in winning both the Feature and Sprint race in a GP2/F2 weekend, with him finishing second in the Sprint Race. Yuki also added a further three pole positions at Spa, Sochi and Bahrain Outer Loop with only Callum Ilott’s five Poles outscoring him in 2020.
Considering it was his debut season against a strong field, Tsunoda was a stellar driver and thoroughly deserved the Anthoine Hubert award for the highest finishing rookie. Despite a mixture of team errors and rookie mistakes along the way, finishing only 15 points behind Schumacher was a significant achievement. Alongside that, his teammate and fellow Red Bull junior, Jehan Daruvala, only scored 72 points in comparison to Yuki’s 200, highlighting the step up Tsunoda made between F3 and F2.
2021: FIA Formula One World Championship
Tsunoda will graduate to F1 and join Scuderia AlphaTauri, becoming the team’s sixth different driver since 2017. He will also be the first driver to be born in the 2000s to compete in the series, so a lot of pressure is on young Japanese driver’s shoulders. Pierre Gasly is high on confidence after a strong 2020 season and will take a lot of skill and determination to be beaten and I expect Yuki to take a few races to adapt before challenging Gasly and the points.
However, AlphaTauri are at considerable risk of being left in no man’s land with McLaren and Aston Martin going from strength to strength, whilst Ferrari are expected to bounce back after an abysmal 2020. It could be quite a lonely fight for seventh in the Championship for the Faenza team, with Gasly and Tsunoda competing against each other more often than the drivers around them.
Expectation: Points Contender
