If the final six Formula 1 races of 2024 are a shootout for next year's Red Bull seat alongside Max Verstappen, then series returnee Liam Lawson certainly made an impression.
Fresh from a spell on the sidelines as Red Bull's reserve driver, Lawson kicked off his stint replacing Daniel Ricciardo at Red Bull's RB team with a third-fastest time in Q1 at Austin. He was three tenths off leader Verstappen, and faster than what team-mate Yuki Tsunoda could muster in qualifying.
Lawson came into Saturday qualifying knowing he would start at the back of the grid on Sunday due to an engine penalty inherited from Ricciardo. He was also shaking off a disappointingly messy lap in sprint qualifying, which prevented him from challenging for points earlier on Saturday.
So, Q1 was his only chance to make an impression, which he certainly did by clocking a third-fastest time - an achievement Red Bull mentor Helmut Marko called "sensational".
"You showed what you had to show," his race engineer told him after his Q1 lap.
"That's all I wanted to do," came the excited reply, tinged with a hint of frustration that his impending grid penalty robbed the New Zealander of what could have been a Q3 spot had he been able to repeat his exploits in the following session.
"That was the goal; to make the most of Q1 to put everything together," Lawson said afterwards. "And that's what we what we did. It's obviously positive, coming from yesterday into today.
"[The grid penalty] is just more frustrating because the performance of the car, the pace, was really strong in Q1. Obviously we'd only really improved from there, is the idea, so there were plenty of positives going forward.
"[Friday] I knew we had performance in the car, and I knew we didn't maximise it. I made a mistake in Q2 and went wide and had a bit of a slow lap.
"We made a further step with it, make some changes, and it's just nice when you put it all together. It feels like I completed what I'd set out to do getting into the car this weekend. Now we need to try and master the race side of it."
But, despite thinking about what could have been a great starting position, Lawson says he still enjoyed being back where he belongs after watching from the sidelines for the past 12 months.
"It was a good feeling, it was nice to be back in a race," he nodded. "Being a reserve driver, I probably didn't realise how much I would miss actually racing and being in competition.
"I've competed every year since I was seven years old, so it was a bit strange and I missed it. It was good to be back."
Additional reporting by Mark Mann-Bryans
