Liam Lawson explains unusual 'guilt' despite strong Racing Bulls results

Liam Lawson has detailed why he feels “guilty” about celebrating strong results in F1.

The New Zealander has enjoyed an upturn in results of late, scoring points at three out of the previous four rounds.

It marks a significant improvement from his early-season form, which saw him demoted from the Red Bull team after just two grands prix.

His recent run of strong results includes a career-best sixth place at the Austrian Grand Prix. 

Lawson highlighted a recent comment provided by world golf number 1 Scottie Scheffler, who stated that winning tournaments is “fulfilling from the sense of accomplishment, but it's not fulfilling from a sense of the deepest places of your heart. If I win, it's going to be awesome for two minutes”.

Drawing his own experience with dealing with sporting pressure, Lawson said: “That [Scheffler's answer] is the best way to describe it. He was very honest.

“Any sport - it’s not even sport - it’s any industry that you're working in, any goal that you're working towards, there's so much that goes into it.

“Especially in F1, there is so much pressure around our jobs. It can relate to not just F1and sport, it can relate to anything.

“For me, I have experience in the sport, so I can talk only on what I know.

“There’s just so much pressure around it and you have these goals. As soon as you reach them, you're straight on to the next one.”

Lawson's future beyond the current season is currently unknown, as only Max Verstappen has his future confirmed within the Red Bull camp.

It installs a state of being under constant pressure to perform, and with a quick turnaround to the next event, he has little time to dwell on his successes.

“At the moment, with how tough the sport is, you have a good result and it's just straight on to the next weekend,” he said.

“Trying to enjoy those moments, it can be very, very hard to enjoy them, just because that's just a mindset you have to have.

“I find it hard to be fully satisfied with something without feeling guilty that I'm not putting the work in for the next weekend or for the next race or the next season or whatever it may be.

“I don't know how it is, but obviously seeing an interview like that from Scottie, it sort of shows you that that's actually just how it is all the way through.

“For anybody that's elite at anything and sport or in business or whatever you're doing, to be the best at it, I think it's almost just the mindset you have to have.”