Red Bull Junior Team: come, see, come
Kacper Sztukaturned 18 last January, after joining the Red Bull youth program in November 2023, he was expected to make his debut in Formula 3 with the MP Motorsport team.
The young Pole had been chosen thanks to a very respectable CV, which had its best reference in victory in Italian F4 with 9 victories, 9 pole positions and 12 podiums and success in the Formula Winter Series.
Something didn’t go right, however, both in his experience in F3 and in his relationships with the Red Bull Junior Team, and results in the first four weekends of 2024 were well below expectations.
In Bahrain Sztuka was classified 20th in the Sprint and 28th in the Feature, in Australia 16th in the Sprint and 18th in the Feature, in Imola 5th in the Sprint and 15th in the Feature, in Monte Carlo a retirement in the Sprint and 11th in the Features. Too little for Red Bull.
The farewell
To communicate the decision of the Red Bull Junior Team rule it out after just 7 months it was Sztuka himself: “In recent weeks my contract with the Red Bull youth program has been terminated, on their initiative. My progress was rated positively by the people I worked with”underlined the Pole, before assuring that he will continue the F3 season with MP Motorsport.
Marko’s hand
The Polish media immediately talked about direct decision by Helmut Marko. Last end of April, the manager of the Red Bull youth program had in fact spoken in less than flattering terms about both Sztuka and his entourage at Parc Fermé: “I didn’t expect such a bad start. He had won F4 in style, but his start it was really slow. And he confirmed the slowness also in the three days of testing in Barcelona. Just compare him to Lindblad, also making his debut, who is younger and has less experience. We do not have a study period. If we were to follow Kacper’s father’s philosophy, he should spend three years in F3 and then five or eight years in F2. At this rate he wouldn’t have arrived in F1 before he was 40! When you talk to the father he always has some excuse ready, lives in a world far from reality. He’s a good man, but he’s always ready to justify it. What matters is his speed and the ability to exploit opportunities.”
After 7 months, the final word. In the Red Bull Junior Team there is no room for apprenticeships.
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