When Yuki Tsunoda sits in his Formula 1 cockpit, he loses all temper. This also affects the performance of the spirited 22-year-old. That’s why the Japanese is now getting a psychologist at his side. It’s not the first time.
The swearing Japanese gets help: Hardly anyone can get so excited in the cockpit of a Formula 1 car like Yuki Tsunoda: He even does it so much that it not only has an extreme impact on the 22-year-old Japanese’s superiors. “It does limit me that my head overheats in the car,” says Tsunoda himself. During his wild tirades, he often violates the boundaries of decency.
Red Bull’s motorsport consultant Dr. The emotional outbursts of the pilot got on Helmut Marko’s nerves so much that he has now assigned a minder to Tsunoda. Marko confessed to ServusTV: “Our problem child is Tsunoda. He explodes on the radio, you think that doesn’t exist at all.”
He has been looked after by a psychologist for four races. Whether the cooperation has already helped, he can not really assess. If so, he probably wouldn’t have had the crash at Silverstone last weekend with his teammate Pierre Gasly. But Tsunoda has hope for improvement. The addition of a psychologist is no longer a rarity in professional sports. And not new for the highly talented Japanese either: “I’ve already worked with another psychologist in Formula 2. I really enjoyed working with him and he was also one of the reasons why I was able to move up to Formula 1.”
In the premier class, for example, the most prominent example of working with a consultant is Lando Norris. The McLaren driver has been working with a psychologist since entering Formula 1 to better withstand the enormous pressure in the series. “It has helped me a lot to make it public and to talk about it with friends and family. I want to help others who also find the strength to speak out through it. So that they see that they are not alone in this,” he said once the “Bild am Sonntag”.
