MOTORSPORT: Ruthless Red Bull's big switch

Daniel Ricciardo has a new teammate, 18-year-old Max Verstappen, after Red Bull Racing's "king maker", Helmut Marko, basically said the Australian had destroyed Daniil Kyvat psychologically after just six weeks of the Formula 1 season.

While Dutch wonderboy Verstappen is suddenly in F1's No. 3 team, 22-year-old Kvyat has been banished to Red Bull's junior outfit Toro Rosso in a straight swap – little more than a fortnight after the Russian was on the podium at the Chinese Grand Prix.

Ricciardo has outpaced Kvyat at the four GPs so far this season, much as he did to four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel in 2014, and Marko felt he would have finished second to the mighty Mercedes of Nico Rosberg in arguably the drive of his life at Shanghai in mid-April after an early puncture.

Marko made no specific mention of Kvyat's tangles with Vettel's Ferrari at the past two GPs as the reason for dropping Kvyat.

Instead, he told German-language media outlets the Russian had not handled the pressure of being Ricciardo's teammate.

"It has increasingly emerged that Daniil hasn't been able to handle the pressure from Daniel Ricciardo," Marko told German magazine Autobild.

And to Austrian website Motorsport-Total.com he said: "It was primarily a measure to take away the pressure on Daniil, which was available this year.

"He has not nearly the same performance as last year. He was an average of three to five tenths [a lap] slower than Ricciardo [this season]. Last year he was at eye level.

"But what was much more difficult [was that] he was very inconsistent, had many ups and downs. Sometimes it was good, as was seen in China, but he has put so much pressure on himself that these fluctuations come automatically.

"The crash in Sochi [Russia, where he punted Vettel twice and ruined his own and Ricciardo's races] is a consequence of the internal pressure, which he has built himself. It did not come from us."

Vettel branded Kvyat a "madman", "suicidal" and a "torpedo" in Shanghai, while last Sunday he screamed expletives as he careered into a wall and out of the Russian race, then visited the Red Bull camp – with which he won four world titles before switching to Ferrari – to reinforce his thoughts on Kvyat.

Red Bull's driver swap not only disciplines Kvyat, who cost Red Bull what it anticipated would have been a good haul of world championship points in Sochi, but is a big sweetener to the ambitious Verstappen and his father, former F1 racer Jos.

Not only will it give the teenager the chance to show his wares in better equipment, it could encourage him to see his future with Red Bull rather than top teams Mercedes and Ferrari.

But the ruthless Marko had a warning for Verstappen too.

"Max has to assert himself over Daniel Ricciardo, which is not easy now," he said.

"Daniel is actually an extremely known quantity."

Verstappen became the youngest driver in F1 history when he made his debut at last year's Australian GP in Melbourne, having been signed at 16.

While the governing Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) was concerned at a driver racing in F1 so young, and moved to prevent it happening again, Verstappen showed incredible ability, although at times he has been outpaced by his Spanish teammate at Toro Rosso, Carlos Sainz Junior.

Verstappen said his promotion to Red Bull Racing from next weekend's Spanish GP after just 23 F1 races was "an amazing opportunity".

Christian Horner, who is the team principal of Red Bull Racing – although Marko is more powerful as the energy drink company tycoon Dietrich Mateschitz's emissary – said Kvyat had the chance to regain form in his return to Toro Rosso, for which he drove in 2014.

"We are in the unique position to have all four drivers across Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso under long-term contracts with Red Bull, so we have the flexibility to move them between the two teams," Horner said.

"Daniil will be able to continue his development at Toro Rosso, in a team that he is familiar with, giving him the chance to regain his form and show his potential."

Marko, 73, who was briefly an F1 driver until blinded in his left eye by a flying stone, but had already won the Le Mans 24-hour sports car classic, said – unconvincingly – that Red Bull "wanted to take Daniil out of the firing line and help his career, rather than harming it".

"Our luxury is that we have the ability to set him up at Toro Rosso again. Romain Grosjean [the French driver now with American team Haas] was once in a similar situation and had crash after crash. We wanted to avoid that," Marko said.

"I do not see this as a demotion [for Kvyatl]. Toro Rosso this year are on a very good level.

"The cards are reshuffled and this also means that Carlos Sainz has a chance to rise [to Red Bull Racing]."

Scottish ex-F1 driver and Le Mans winner Allan McNish has said on the BBC's website that he can imagine the usually unsmiling Marko "smirking about the prospect of Verstappen v Ricciardo".

"The Australian has emerged as a potential superstar in his own right in the last two years, completely overshadowing Vettel in 2014 and proving very fast and classy," McNish said.

"After a brilliant 2014, including three wins, he did not have the best of seasons last year. The car was not very good initially, and he did not adapt to it that well.

"But once he got the car underneath him, he was rocking and rolling – and he has continued that at the start of this season."

Ricciardo is fourth in the world championship with 36 points, sandwiched between Ferrari pair Kimi Raikkonen and Vettel and behind Mercedes' Rosberg and reigning champion Lewis Hamilton, despite Red Bull's RB12 still being down on power – a disadvantage that a major upgrade from Renault next month could diminish somewhat.

The BBC's chief F1 writer Andrew Benson said in an analysis of the Red Bull driver swap that "Marko has a reputation as a ruthless character, and F1 as a sport in the same vein".

"But the decision to drop swap Kvyat and Verstappen just four races into the season is undoubtedly extreme," Benson wrote.

"Kvyat made two clumsy mistakes in the space of a few hundred metres at the start of Sunday's Russian GP, both of them involving crashing into the back of Sebastian Vettel's Ferrari.

"Yet those errors came just two weeks after Kvyat had put Red Bull on the podium for the first and so far only time this year at the Chinese GP.

"Has Marko, who runs Red Bull's junior driver programme, really dumped Kvyat on the basis of one poor result?

"Well, not really.

"Kvyat has not lived up to expectations. He has shown flashes of promise, undoubtedly, but teammate Ricciardo is clearly the quicker driver.

"This decision, though, is as much about Verstappen as it is Kvyat.

"The 18-year-old, is the hottest young property in F1. He wowed observers with some of his inspirational and improvisational overtaking moves last season – attracting the attention of Mercedes and Ferrari.

"Promoting Verstappen to the senior team is as good a way as any of stopping his eyes wandering too much and keeping him in the fold.

"As ever in F1, the politics and the sport are inextricably wrapped together."

Randle gets a handle on racing overseas
It was only after we reported earlier in the week on the successes of Joey Mawson in German Formula 4 and Ryan Briscoe in Ford's new GT in the US that word reached us of another Aussie's success abroad.

Victorian Thomas Randle, runner-up in Australia's first F4 championship last year, scored his maiden win in the British Formula 3 series (curiously for F4 cars) at the Rockingham circuit.

Driving for Douglas Motorsport, Randle, 20, carved his way through the field from fifth place after a red flag for that victory and was fourth in two other races there last weekend.

He is fourth in the championship, but just four points behind second place and 26 behind leader Ricky Collard after three of eight rounds. He's ahead of highly-rated Lando Norris, who won the Toyota Series in New Zealand last summer but has missed one of the British rounds.

Three Aussies are in the top five of the US F2000 Championship – Luke Gabin second on 80 points, Jordan Lloyd, the inaugural Australian F4 champion last year, is third on 78 and Anthony Martin fifth on 71, with two rounds next weekend on the Indianapolis road course.

The IndyCars also will be racing there, two weeks before the 100th Indianapolis 500 at The Brickyard.

Toyota takes to the tracks with its 86
The start of the new Toyota 86 Racing Series is only a fortnight away on the V8 Supercar Championship program at Victoria's Winton circuit.

Toyota enthusiasts are gearing up for that this weekend at the 'Festival of 86' at Canberra's Sutton Road Driver Training Centre.

Apart from 86s in action on the 2.5km road course, the AE86, mid-engine MR2, Celica Coupe and Supra models will be on display.

Ben Grice, son of the dual Bathurst 1000 winner Allan, is one of the drivers confirmed for the new 86 series.

Les Small, a famous engineer in Allan Grice's success, will provide technical assistance to the young Grice in the 86 entered by former racer Bruce Williams.

The other four rounds in the 86 series are on the V8 Supercar program at Sydney Motorsport Park at the end of August, Melbourne's Sandown in mid-September, Bathurst in October and the Sydney 500 finale at the end of November.

Canberra and Coffs rallies on Reeves' radar
Australia's top young rally driving talent, Brendan Reeves, will be back in the national championship at this month's Canberra round.

Reeves and his co-driver sister Rhiannon Gelsomino will be in their 2006 Subaru Impreza for the National Capital Rally on May 27-29.

"I've been spending a lot of time bringing the Subaru up to speed as it hasn't been rallied since the Akademos Rally in Victoria at the end of 2014 and I'm looking forward to getting behind the wheel again," said Reeves, who also plans to compete in Rally Australia at Coffs Harbour in November.