Red Bull hires psychologist to help 'problem child' Tsunoda

Helmut Marko says Red Bull has hired a psychologist to assist AlphaTauri in its efforts to bring young gun Yuki Tsunoda's fiery temper under control.

The 22-year-old Japanese who is currently in his second year of F1 with the Faenza-based outfit was herald as an outstanding talent by Red Bull when he was promoted to the big time last year.

But Tsunoda's apprenticeship in F1 has been a bumpy for team and driver, with flashes of brilliance offset by many mistakes and crashes, the last of which was a costly run-in last weekend at Silverstone with AlphaTauri teammate Pierre Gasly.

While mishaps are an inevitable part of a driver's development in F1, Tsunoda's actions frequently exude a fiery temper that he has struggled to quell.

"We have organised a kind of psychologist to work with him, because he continued to rant through the corners, so that impacts his performance," said Marko, talking to Servus TV.

Marko noted that Tsunoda's radio outbursts contrast with the relatively restrained behaviour of Max Verstappen who generally succeeds in keeping his emotions under control.

"We should keep our emotions in check," added Marko. "Thank God Max is calm, our problem child in this respect - not only in this respect - is Tsunoda.

"He explodes on the radio, you wouldn't believe it."

• Read also: Apologetic Tsunoda owns up to costly contact with Gasly

After the British Grand Prix, Tsunoda, who was inadvertently involved in the start-line crash at Silverstone, apologized to his team for his lap 11 contact with Gasly, a move that sent both cars off the road and that ultimately led to the Frenchman's retirement later in the day.

Looking ahead at this weekend's Austrian Grand Prix, Tsunoda said that he is determined to "make up" for his disappointing display last Sunday.

"I am glad that we can go racing again after just a few days to put the Silverstone race behind us," he has said.

"I couldn’t do anything about the collision after the start and later, unfortunately, I had the incident with Pierre. We discussed it as a team and now we move forward.

"We will be fully focussed on making up for the disappointment of Silverstone.

"I enjoyed this race (Austria) last year, making it through to Q3 and scoring a point for tenth place. Looking at how we performed here last year, I expect we could be quite competitive."

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