Lawson Has 89 Points. Steiner Says His Title Chance Lies Outside Red Bull.
GOATIFYAt 89 points and ninth in the Formula 1 drivers' standings, Liam Lawson has made one of the clearest arguments on the grid for keeping his job. His reward is an unresolved 2027 contract and an awkward question about whether the team that developed him can still take him where he wants to go.
Former Haas team principal Guenther Steiner believes Lawson has the raw ability to become a world champion, but not the route to one through Red Bull. The advice sounds dramatic: find a path outside the organisation. Yet Steiner also expects Racing Bulls to retain the New Zealander for next season. Those are not mutually exclusive positions. One concerns keeping a valuable seat for 2027; the other concerns a realistic chance of reaching a front-running car later.
The immediate facts make the dilemma sharp. Lawson's strong run includes repeated seventh-place finishes, a standout Brazilian Grand Prix and a temporary return to Red Bull this summer. Isack Hadjar, however, is already confirmed alongside Max Verstappen for 2027. Racing Bulls must also balance Lawson against current team-mate Arvid Lindblad and Formula 2 prospect Nikola Tsolov. Lawson's performances answer what he can do now. They do not, by themselves, decide who will offer him a car capable of winning titles.
Lawson's 89 points make the case better than any promise
The headline number is 89. That is Lawson's official total with three rounds remaining, a haul that places him ninth in the Drivers' Championship. Formula 1's driver profile records 15 top-ten finishes from 20 Grands Prix, plus sprint points. Those numbers are not simply the product of one freak result. They describe a driver who repeatedly puts a midfield car where a mistake from a more powerful team can turn into a meaningful result.
Four seventh-place finishes in his recent run are especially revealing. Seventh may not sound extraordinary in a sport obsessed with winners, but there is usually a substantial performance gap between the four leading teams and the rest of the field. If eight cars ordinarily occupy the strongest positions, fighting for seventh requires beating at least one of them or taking full advantage when qualifying, weather, strategy or reliability shifts the normal order. That is a useful measure of what Lawson has been doing at Racing Bulls.
Brazil provided the clearest recent illustration. In a wet qualifying session at Interlagos, Lawson put his car fifth on raw qualifying performance. Grid penalties for other drivers elevated him to third on the starting grid. He launched well enough to move into second early in the race, then finished seventh after the event settled into a more familiar hierarchy. It would be misleading to describe that result as a squandered podium without considering the cars behind him. He had earned the opportunity; keeping substantially faster rivals behind over a Grand Prix distance was a different challenge.
The weekend also highlights why a points total needs context. Lawson can be strong on a changing surface and still lack the sustained pace needed to hold a podium. He can outperform direct rivals through clean execution without possessing machinery that would regularly win against Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren and Red Bull. That gap between individual performance and car potential is precisely the distinction Steiner is making. A driver can prove he deserves attention long before a championship-capable vacancy becomes available.
Lawson's season has also shown an ability to return to useful results after difficult weekends. A sequence of points finishes does not erase the need to adapt at every circuit, but it provides evidence beyond a single qualifying lap. Tire management, defensive racing, starts and limiting the damage on less competitive days all contribute to how a driver looks to team bosses. A midfield team values those qualities because points from seventh, eighth or ninth can materially change a constructors' position and the financial rewards attached to it.
Racing Bulls has been competitive enough for consistent points but not consistently quick enough to ask Lawson to fight for wins. His current ranking, therefore, supports two different conclusions at once: retaining him would protect an experienced source of points, while keeping him indefinitely in the same performance bracket would leave his title ambitions dependent on a leap forward in the car. Steiner's assessment is an opinion about that ceiling, not a prediction that Lawson would automatically become a champion if another team hired him.
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Hadjar's confirmed seat changes what a Red Bull comeback could mean
Lawson already knows how quickly a promotion can turn into a demotion. Red Bull put him alongside Max Verstappen at the start of 2025, then moved him back to its sister team after only two race weekends. That short trial became an outsized part of the debate around his career. It was a difficult environment in which to judge a developing driver, but it also showed how little patience the senior team can have when results do not arrive immediately.
There was a brief second chance this year, though it was never the ordinary promotion that Lawson might have wanted. In August, Red Bull called him up when Isack Hadjar injured his wrist. Lawson took the senior car at Zandvoort, continued at Monza and stayed for the new Madrid Grand Prix while Hadjar recovered. The team publicly thanked him for stepping in. That three-race assignment provided another opportunity to work with the leading outfit and its systems, but its purpose was cover for an absent driver, not a decision to replace Hadjar permanently.
The distinction matters because Red Bull settled its 2027 lineup before the present uncertainty over Racing Bulls had been resolved. On September 23, the team announced a contract extension keeping Hadjar alongside Verstappen for next season. Hadjar had already earned praise for his speed and development after stepping up from Racing Bulls. His injury did not persuade the organisation to reopen the seat for Lawson. By the time the discussion reached November, the straightforward route from the sister squad to the senior team was closed for 2027.
That does not make a future Red Bull drive mathematically impossible. Formula 1 contracts and competitive circumstances can change. But it does explain Steiner's skepticism. A driver can have a better year than anyone reasonably expected and still encounter an occupied seat above him. The development ladder is not a guarantee of promotion; it is a network of opportunities shaped by timing, existing contracts and the team principal's long-term judgment.
Lawson's three races with Red Bull also complicate an easy narrative that his 2025 demotion defined him. By 2026 he had more experience, a clearer record of extracting points from Racing Bulls and a chance to show greater composure under the senior team's scrutiny. His results from that temporary spell count within his season, but the return itself should not be mistaken for an endorsement of a permanent move. A substitute can deliver what is needed while the original driver still holds the team's future plans.
There is another practical consideration. If Lawson leaves the Red Bull organisation without a signed place elsewhere, a more prestigious badge does not automatically follow. Seats at the leading teams are scarce, and the strongest contracts may stretch beyond a single winter. A sensible long-term strategy would protect a confirmed race seat first, continue producing measurable results and pursue outside opportunities when they are genuinely available. That is closer to Steiner's argument than an instruction for Lawson to walk away from his present team immediately.
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Racing Bulls still has three contenders for two 2027 seats
Before Lawson can map an exit route, he needs clarity about the seat he already occupies. Racing Bulls team principal Alan Permane said ahead of the Brazilian Grand Prix that the outfit was still weighing three candidates for its two places: Lawson, rookie Arvid Lindblad and Red Bull junior Nikola Tsolov. Neither 2027 race seat had been confirmed at that point. Permane described a deliberate assessment rather than announcing a choice, and that distinction still matters as the season enters its final three rounds.
Each candidate answers a different question. Lawson offers points, knowledge of the current team's operation and a season of evidence under multiple conditions. Lindblad offers a successful transition from the junior ranks and the prospect of further growth after his rookie campaign. Tsolov offers the upside of a leading Formula 2 prospect, but promoting him means asking the organisation to absorb the unpredictability that comes with another newcomer. A team chasing fifth place in the Constructors' standings has to evaluate more than the identities of its best-known drivers.
Permane has previously identified Tsolov as an important driver in the pipeline, but being next in line is not the same as having a 2027 contract. The senior-team decision involving Hadjar does not require Racing Bulls to fill its own car with a fresh graduate. It could choose continuity, it could prioritize a new prospect, or it could make a different combination of two drivers. Red Bull's reputation for accelerating young talent helps explain why the question remains open even when one existing driver has a strong points record.
The performance comparison favors Lawson on immediate results. Formula 1's account of the team decision before Brazil had him ahead of Lindblad in the championship, with significantly more points, while Lindblad's rookie year still included a substantial number of top-ten finishes. That is not evidence the younger driver lacks talent. It is evidence that the team is deciding between different stages of development. Lawson is being judged against the consistency expected from a driver who has already survived a demotion and fought his way back into the points.
Steiner's view adds a second layer to the decision. If Racing Bulls extends Lawson, the short-term result is security. It allows him to enter another season without a disruptive search for a seat and gives him more opportunities to build a reputation against future regulations and competitors. The long-term question would remain: how many strong midfield seasons does a driver need before an outside team treats him as a serious candidate rather than a convenient name on a shortlist?
Leaving the programme would not guarantee a top-four car, either. It would mean pursuing opportunities beyond the organisation that currently gives Lawson a race seat. The timing of that move could be more consequential than the principle. Waiting for the right opening might improve his chances; forcing a move without one could take him away from the very platform on which he has made this season's progress. A contract for 2027 and an ambition to explore a different path later are compatible, not contradictory.
There is still racing to do. The calendar takes the championship to Las Vegas, Qatar and Abu Dhabi, and each weekend is another piece of evidence about Lawson's capacity to qualify well, race consistently and deliver points under pressure. Those performances may help Racing Bulls settle its lineup, but they cannot create a vacancy at Red Bull while Hadjar and Verstappen remain contracted. At 24, Lawson has time to construct a longer career. The urgency comes from F1's compressed market for competitive seats, not from an immediate expiration date on his ability.
For now the central question is not whether Lawson is talented enough for Formula 1. His season has moved that debate forward. It is whether a team with a powerful junior programme can reward an established driver without a guaranteed promotion route, and whether the driver can keep his options open without surrendering a proven race seat. Steiner is betting on the need for a different address eventually. The team still has to decide if it wants Lawson's current one to stay the same for another year.
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Lawson's 89 points are a powerful reason for Racing Bulls to keep him, not proof that the Red Bull ladder will carry him to a title fight. Hadjar's confirmed place alongside Verstappen and the unresolved Lawson-Lindblad-Tsolov choice make those separate questions. Steiner believes the New Zealander may ultimately need a different team to reach the front. The sensible next move depends on who actually offers him a car, not merely on who says he deserves one.
