Christian Horner clarifies VCARB Imola session purpose after major Perez and Ricciardo updates

Sergio Perez, Red Bull, and Daniel Ricciardo, VCARB

With Sergio Perez and Daniel Ricciardo going nowhere, Red Bull team boss Christian Horner insisted that the upcoming VCARB Imola visit, featuring Liam Lawson, is just a “filming day”.

Horner met with Red Bull senior advisor Helmut Marko on the Monday after the Belgian Grand Prix, with the future of Sergio Perez – Max Verstappen’s Red Bull team-mate – a key topic on the agenda, with any decision carrying major implications for Ricciardo too at junior team VCARB.

Daniel Ricciardo and Liam Lawson Imola outing a ‘filming day’

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

Red Bull ultimately settled on making no changes, meaning Perez retains his seat and Ricciardo does the same at VCARB, which raises question marks over the future of current Red Bull reserve Lawson, who is set to join Ricciardo and the Aussie’s fellow VCARB driver Yuki Tsunoda in taking the current VCARB01 around Imola on July 31.

With Ricciardo and Lawson having been seen as the contenders to replace Perez if Red Bull had chosen to do so – which has not happened with Ricciardo also retaining his seat – what does this Imola outing now mean for Lawson?

Horner made it clear that this is simply VCARB using their second permitted filming day of the season, so “it’s all about content” gathering.

“It’s a filming day, so they’ll be filming,” Horner told media including PlanetF1.com.

“So, it’s all about content.

“It is in a current car because you can do 200 kilometers in the current car, so they will both [Ricciardo and Lawson] be doing plenty of filming.”

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Marko recently revealed a desire from Red Bull shareholders for VCARB to return to its roots as the Red Bull junior team, with Lawson’s contract reportedly featuring a clause that will free him to leave if he is not offered a seat within Red Bull by the end of September.

This decision for Red Bull to keep and Perez and Ricciardo in place after the summer break therefore creates question marks over Lawson’s future.

He earned the recognition of Horner though, who talked up the strength of options in the Red Bull pool, which also includes the likes of Formula 2 Championship leader Isack Hadjar and Formula 3 title contender Arvid Lidblad.

“We’ve got issues today, but you’ve got to have solutions for tomorrow as well,” said Horner. “I think we’ve got a tremendous pool of talent.

“We’ve got experience, we’ve got youth, we’ve got Liam in the wings, we’ve got Hadjar doing a super job in F2, we’ve got Arvid Lindblad who I think is a really exciting talent in F3. So I think we’ve built some great talent in our squad.”

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