Behind the meme: The real story behind Liam Lawson’s viral dazed photo

If you’ve ever found yourself on ‘Formula 1 Twitter,’ there’s a high likelihood you’ve stumbled across a viral Liam Lawson photo. The image in question shows the 22-year-old looking dazed as he emerges from slumber underneath a duvet with a half-packed suitcase next to his bed.

The snap has been used in a variety of funny contexts: “liam lawson waking up to find out he’s an f1 driver again,” one fan wrote in Septemberwhen he replaced Daniel Ricciardo. During last month’s very rainy Brazilian Grand Prix, another fan captioned the pic, “the entirety of the f1 grid waking up tomorrow for a 7:30am qualifying session.” A third fan simply wrote, “Guys I need to know the story behind THE Liam Lawson picture. Who took this? What’s happening? Why’s he up?”

So, I put my investigative journalism degree to work for an answer. Luckily, Lawson and his partner, Hannah St. John, kindly allowed me to hitch a ride with them to the Las Vegas Grand Prix —you can watch the full video here— making for a prime opportunity to ask the VCARB driver about the famous photo.

“You mean the one of me looking like I’m absolutely wasted?” Lawson said.

“It’s because he was,” St. John chimed in with a laugh.

When I described the image as a throwback, Lawson informed me, “you know, I wasn’t young — that was like three years ago.”

“I don’t drink,” he explained. “But I drink once a year, and that’s on New Year’s. It was 2021 after the DTM race at Norisring, and after I got absolutely smashed out and lost the championship in a really horrible way. That night, I went out, and I hadn’t drunk all year — obviously, because I don’t drink — and it was just not a good idea.”

Lawson had no idea that an image of him looking, er, a little worse for wear, when he woke up the following morning would have such staying power on the internet. “My friend took that photo and I didn’t even know he posted it, but every year it keeps coming back up,” he said. “This year it’s come out even more. He [his friend] thinks it’s hilarious, but it’s definitely not my finest moment.”