Scuderia AlphaTauri Taps Yuki Tsunoda for Honda in 2021 F1 Season
Tsunoda will join Pierre Gasly at Scuderia Alpha Tauri Honda to race in the 2021 Formula 1 season
Earlier this year, Honda announced that it will be dropping out of Formula One at the end of the 2021 season. The company joined forces with Red Bull Racing as an engine partner, and so far, the Japanese automaker has enjoyed a very successful Grand Prix run.
Honda currently powers Scuderia Alpha Tauri and Red Bull Racing Formula One team, and the company has now announced that Yuki Tsunoda will join the Scuderia Alpha Tauri Honda team for the 2021 season. Tsunoda will partner with Pierre Gasly for the upcoming F1 season.
Tsunoda was a part of Honda’s Junior Driver program, and the 20-year-old will now go on to be the first Japanese driver to race in Formula One since Kamui Kobayashi, who retired from Formula One in 2014 after his brief stint at Caterham. Tsunoda will also be a spiritual successor to Takuma Sato, who was the last Japanese race car driver to compete in Formula one with Honda’s support.
Last year, the Japanese race car driver impressed everyone by performing exceptionally in the Formula 2 championship. The young racing driver claimed victory in 3 races and secured 4 podium finishes, which allowed Tsunoda to finish in 3rd place overall.
By securing 3rd place last year, Tsunoda managed to get enough points to qualify for a Superlicense that allows him to compete in Formula One. Tsunoda’s F4 Japanese championship win in 2018 was a career highlight for the driver, who followed up his victory by competing in FIA Formula 3 Championship in the following year.
The 20-year-old is grateful for the opportunity, “Like most racing drivers, it has always been my goal to race in Formula 1, so I am very happy with this news. I want to thank Scuderia AlphaTauri, Red Bull and Dr. Helmut Marko for giving me this opportunity, and of course everyone from Honda, for all their support so far in my career, giving me great opportunities to race in Europe.
I must also thank the teams that I have raced with to get to this point, particularly Carlin, with whom I have learned so much this year. I realize that I will be carrying the hopes of a lot of Japanese F1 fans next year and I will be doing my best for them, too.”
The Team Principal of the Scuderia Alpha Tauri Formula One team, Franz Tost was also quite pleased by Tsunoda’s consistent performance in the tests and considers the Japanese Formula One driver to be a great asset to the team.
Tost shared his thoughts on Tsunoda’s selection, “Red Bull has been following Yuki’s career for a while now and I am sure he will be a great asset to our team. Watching him in Formula 2 this year, he has demonstrated the right mix of racing aggression and good technical understanding.
During the test in Imola in November when he drove our 2018 car, his lap times were very consistent over a race simulation, he progressed throughout the day and gave our engineers useful feedback.
In addition, his integration with the Honda engineers has been seamless, which certainly helps. At the test in Abu Dhabi this week, he proved to be a fast learner and that he is ready to make the step to Formula 1.”
Tsunoda will now advance to Honda’s hybrid power unit and part ways with the Carlin team.
Photos: Honda
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