Yuki Tsunoda, Isack Hadjar and Liam Lawson are giving the Austrian and Italian teams something to think about for 2026 and beyond.

Gradually, Tsunoda is finding his feet at Red Bull, and while there is still some way to go it can now be seen that much of the problem is with the car. Whether he will retain his seat in 2026 remains to be seen, and while the Austrian outfit is busy flogging his merchandise the fact is that next year it parts company with Honda.

Hadjar has impressed in the RB, but some fear that the step up to the big team might compromise his career, much as it has done with Lawson and many drivers before.

"I think that's a tricky one at this time of year," said RB boss Alan Permane when asked if the French driver is ready for the move. "Fortunately, we don't have to make that decision at this time of year.

"I think what we have to do for Isack is to make sure that we - the trackside team - deliver perfection for him," he continued. "So he's got a car he can perform well in, and he needs to perform well. He needs to deliver perfection as well. And I think we've seen, when he does that and when the car is right and suits the circuit, and he puts it all together, we can have a super strong weekend.

Asked about Hadjar's strengths, Perman replied: "The first strength is he's incredibly quick, and without that, all the other strengths are kind of insignificant, really. He's got the speed, which we've seen.

"One thing I like about him is he's ready to listen," he continued, "he's ready to accept advice and help. He doesn't want to do everything his own way. He knows... what has he done now, 15 races? Maybe 16? I'm not sure. Sixteen. So he's happy to accept advice and input from others and take that on board and learn from it. We can see sometimes he's a little bit harsh on himself, which he's working on, I think. But strength-wise, I think that's the main takeaway is that he's happy to learn.

"What he can do to improve? I think, of course, he's working on all areas and what he can do better. If I had one area he could do better on, it's maybe qualifying. And I don't say that as a negative. I think when he gets it right, we see what he can do - in Zandvoort, fourth on the grid. He was heading for a similar result in Budapest and didn't quite get it right, got caught out by the wind.

"There's a couple of times - which is completely understandable in a rookie season - where you don't put that final lap together when you're in that final session and the pressure's there. So if I had one thing he could do slightly better, I guess it's some qualifying consistency."

Asked what Lawson needs to do in order to retain his seat, Perman said:" I think the same as Isack, the same as all other 19 drivers are trying to do - execute perfect race weekends.

"No one's going to be bringing any more upgrades - or I doubt very much anyone's bringing any more upgrades this weekend. So we've got what we've got at the track. We've got the car that we've got. So it's for him and his engineers - and the support we have back from the UK and Faenza in Italy - to deliver as close to a perfect car as we can for him. And he needs to deliver perfect race weekends."

And, of course, there is Tsunoda. Asked what stood out for his when he worked with the Japanese last year, Permane admitted: "His speed, for one thing.

"I didn't know Yuki at all before I started with the team in '24," he continued, "and I was immediately impressed by him - by his pace, by how he can handle the tyres, his qualifying pace, how he could get on top of the tyres as quickly as he did to extract the most out of the car in qualifying. That was the very first thing that surprised me.

"And his feedback, the way he is in the car, the way he drives, the way he's out of the car - are really in line with the top drivers. He's a great driver. And honestly, that was a little bit of a - let's say - it was a surprise. I guess I hadn't thought about it, but it was a nice surprise when I got to start working with him."

Other than Red Bull's split with Honda, Tsunoda is under intense pressure to keep Hadjar out of his seat at Red Bull, while, other than Lawson, Arvid Lindblad is very much in the mix.

However, the popular Japanese driver is focussed on retaining his current drive.

"It's the same as what I said previously," he replied when asked about the speculation. "I heard today there are a lot of apparent speculation, but I was not really watching the media to pay attention. I don't know. I just keep what I'm doing, keep doing the things that I'm doing so far and keep focusing on performance, and just show the progress of the races. My main priority is to stay here."

Asked what aspects of his driving he is focussing on, he admits that his long runs need attention.

"Long runs, especially for now, the way I have to focus most of the times really, especially once I had a bit damage as well, he said, referring to Monza.

"We also as a team worked hard to understand what's the kind of main issue causing the long run pace and actually if we work pre-practices, the things that we experience is things that even the team can't really explain it."

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