Yuki Tsunoda: Future F1 star or another underexperienced rookie?

 By Louis Walker

It’s no secret that when it was announced that Japan’s Yuki Tsunoda was going to be racing for AlphaTauri for the 2021 Formula One season, a lot of people were hyped. He would be the first Japanese driver to race in F1 since Kamui Kobayashi drove for Caterham in 2014, and the first driver to be born in the 2000’s. But after 16 races in 2021, the question still remains: does Yuki Tsunoda deserve to be in F1?

Born in Sagamihara in Kanagawa, Tsunoda’s professional racing career began the same way as most F1 drivers did, in karting. Debuting in the JAF Junior Karting Championship in 2010, he progressed to both the regional and national classes in 2013 and 2014 respectively. While information is scarce on his results in these categories, the experienced gained from karting meant that Tsunoda would eventually graduate to single seater car racing, making his debut in the Japanese Formula 4 Championship at the end of 2016, before racing in the series full time in 2017.

What followed would be the first signs that Yuki had the potential to be a successful racing driver, with 3 wins and 6 podiums earning him a solid 3rd place in the championship in his rookie season. 2018 would prove to be even better, however, as his experience and speed from the previous season resulted in him winning the championship in convincing fashion, with 7 wins and 11 podiums to his name.

Of course, the natural progression after winning a Formula 4 Championship is to land a drive in Formula 3, and that’s exactly what happened. Signing with Jenzer Motorsport for the 2019 FIA Formula 3 Championship, Yuki would have moderate success over the season, with 3rd place at the Monza feature race and a win during the sprint race that same weekend being the highlight of his season. He would finish 9th in the standings with 67 points.

Despite not making a huge impact in his rookie F3 season, Tsunoda would progress to FIA Formula 2 with Carlin for the 2020 season. Whilst F2 is usually a difficult series for rookies to excel in, Yuki would quickly find his feet by scoring a podium in the third race of the season in Austria. 3 wins and a further 6 podiums would lead to him being the highest placed rookie and therefore earn himself the Anthoine Hubert Award, finishing 3rd overall behind Mick Schumacher (who also graduated to F1 in 2021) and Callum Ilott.

With Yuki having a strong backing from Honda (under the Honda Formula Dream Project), and Daniil Kvyat having an underwhelming 2020 season, the door was left wide open for Tsunoda to take the second seat at Scuderia AlphaTauri Honda for the 2021 Formula One season. Expectations were high after his strong F2 campaign. Those expectations were met in the first round at Bahrain, where he would score 2 points on his debut after finishing 9th, and it seemed that all the hype generated pre-season was valid. However, this would be his only points finish in the first 5 races.  Whereas his teammate Gasly would score points in 4 of these races with a best finish of 6th. This was mostly down to a combination of poor qualifying performances hindering his race pace, and multiple crashes of his own accord. Round 2 at Imola saw Tsunoda crash at the start of qualifying, which led to a 12th place finish after starting from the back of the grid.

It wouldn’t be until round 6 in Azerbaijan until he would score more points, picking up the pieces after Lance Stroll and Max Verstappen both suffered heavy crashes after high-speed tyre failures allowing him to score his best result of the season so far in 7th. However, with Gasly finishing on the podium in 3rd, that result was quickly forgotten. Three more points finishes over the next 9 races brings Yuki’s points tally up to 18 so far, compared to Gasly who currently sits on 74 points.

Last time out at Turkey essentially summed up the season that Tsunoda has had. A strong qualifying session in mixed conditions saw him line up 9th on the grid but was once again overshadowed by teammate Gasly pulling in another superb performance to line up 4th. The race would start strong for Yuki, holding off 7-time world champion Lewis Hamilton for the first 8 laps before the Brit was able to pass around the outside at turn 3. Despite this, the Japanese driver felt that he should have done more, saying “I tried to hold him behind for 20 laps. Eight laps is not enough.” A few laps later would see him spin out of the points and finish a disappointing 14th, with Gasly scoring a further 8 points in 6th position.

Tsunoda and Gasly have both been retained by AlphaTauri for the 2022 season, but with Honda pulling out of the sport at the end of this year and only 6 rounds remaining this season, Yuki will have to impress next year if he wants to remain in F1 in the long term and avoid the wrath of Helmut Marko.