Tsunoda wants to "build up confidence" as he debriefs his first day at Red Bull

Yuki Tsunoda wants to "build up more confidence" throughout the weekend at the Japanese Grand Prix as he looks back on his first day at Red Bull.

The Japanese driver was promoted to the Austrian team after originally being overlooked at the end of the 2024 season, replacing the demoted Liam Lawson after he struggled to get to grips with a tricky RB21.

As a result, Tsunoda makes his Red Bull Racing debut at his home Grand Prix at Suzuka, with hundreds of thousands of home fans watching the 24-year-old start his career at the Austrian team.

Yuki Tsunoda in action at the Japanese Grand Prix

Tsunoda happy with FP1, but knows more needs to be done after FP2

It was a really positive start for Tsunoda at Suzuka, finishing within a tenth of a second of teammate Max Verstappen in FP1, taking P6 as a result. In FP2, P18 was all he could manage, but due to four red flags, he did not get a chance to run with the soft tyres.

"FP1 was better than expected," Tsunda started by saying while speaking to F1TV.

"It was a good start for myself. In FP2, I didn't set a lap time. I think there is lots of work do. We’ll have to look through data from FP2 more. But overall, it's okay. I just have to build up my confidence more," continued the Japanese driver.

Read also

Horner defends decision to demote Lawson: "He's not out of Formula One"

Driver swap at Red Bull 'not news' for Sainz: 'The way things go there'

Of course, the intrigue would be to see how Tsunoda would deal with the RB21, reportedly an extremely difficult car to drive. The 24-year-old only had simulator runs to trial it out, so how did he find getting behind the wheel of the Red Bull car for the first time?

"It's a bit different to the simulator and what I felt, to be honest," Tsunoda admitted.

"There is maybe a little bit more than what I expected in terms of the feeling of the car. But yeah, I knew anyway it was going to be a bit different in the real car, and it was just a little bit more exaggerated in the real car, feeling a bit more tricky," concluded the Japanese driver.