Red Bull junior Iwasa to contest F1 Japan FP1 for RB

The RB team is fielding an all-Japanese line-up in first free practice with Iwasa joining regular driver Yuki Tsunoda in the VCARB 01 in their home round.

RB has given Iwasa the first of two mandatory rookie FP1 slots for the year, with the 22-year-old among the roster of young driver prospects that also includes reserve driver Liam Lawson and F2 driver Isack Hadjar.

“I am very happy to be able to participate in an official F1 session in my home country, and I am excited to be able to take the first step toward the realisation of my dream – winning races and capture the world championship title for many consecutive years in F1, the world’s most prestigious series," Iwasa said.

Iwasa made his F1 testing debut at last November's Abu Dhabi young driver test for the team then called AlphaTauri.

Team principal Laurent Mekies said he made a good impression at Yas Marina and has since been involved in supporting the race team in the simulator.

“He did a great job in the Abu Dhabi test at the end of last year when he drove for us for the first time, Mekies said.

"Since then, he has been doing a lot a valuable work in our simulator, including providing live race support.

"This on-track experience will be important for his growth as a young driver, as well as providing him and our engineers with a useful real-track correlation of the work he carries out for us in the simulator."

Daniel Ricciardo, RB F1 Team VCARB 01 (Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images)

This year Iwasa competes in Japan's domestic Super Formula series, scoring ninth on his Suzuka debut with Mugen as the top rookie.

Previously Iwasa won the 2020 French F4 championship, which led to an F3 campaign with Hitech and two years in F2 with DAMS.

Last year he scored three wins on his way to fourth in the championship, with too many non-scores to be a factor in the title fight.

While RB is no longer a pure Red Bull junior team, CEO Peter Bayer told Autosport that training young drivers for Red Bull was still a core task, aiming to have one younger driver alongside a more experienced hand at the Anglo-Italian outfit.

RB has therefore ramped up its TPC (testing of a previous car) programme, which now allows drivers to privately test the 2022 cars, which are much closer to the current specification than the 2021 generation that was allowed last year.

"Oscar Piastri is the best example. He ran I don't know how many hundreds or thousands of miles [with Alpine], but he came in and he understood the car," Bayer said. "He understood the dynamics, he understood the switches, and it makes such a big difference, and so it connects you fully.

“And we have a big programme actually for Liam, Isack and potentially Iwasa, and we want to make sure that we run them as much as possible also. It's interesting that the previous car [that can be tested] is a 2022 car, so it's finally a relevant car.”