The secret of what Red Bull finds so special about Isack Hadjar

In recent years, Red Bull Racing has cycled through an alarming number of drivers. Verstappen has remained constant while in the other garage there have been a number of departures since Daniel Ricciardo left the team.

After Pierre Gasly, Alexander Albon, Sergio Perez, Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda, it will be Hadjar’s turn to stop that trend. The Frenchman impressed in his rookie Formula 1 season and was quickly offered the promotion for the new F1 season.

At the end of 2025, GPblog spoke with Hamelin, who worked closely with Hadjar for a year as his race engineer. Hamelin, like Hadjar, is also from France, has worked with the likes of Sainz and Ricciardo, but when asked who stood out most during his time at Racing Bulls, Hamelin immediately names Hadjar and gives a ringing endorsement as to what caught Red Bull's eye and convinced them to promote the young driver.

“In terms of relationship, it’s hard to compare. If you have a good season, that makes everything a lot easier," he said. "What’s very impressive about Isack is how much he already understands about Formula 1 given the (limited) experience he had beforehand. Also, the small number of mistakes he makes is impressive.”

Hadjar started his first Formula 1 season with a slip-up in Australia, an error on the way to the grid where he was famously comforted by Lewis Hamilton's dad, Anthony, but otherwise made very few errors for the remainder of the year. He even finished on the podium at Zandvoort.

Speed, however, is not the only thing that’s evaluated. The question to the Racing Bulls race engineer was therefore what matters most to him in a driver? What does a race engineer need from his driver?

He added: “There are a few things that are interesting for me to watch. First is race consistency. For most drivers you look at the lap times and ask yourself whether he can use the car consistently, or whether there’s a small mistake that costs a few tenths—and then happens again a few laps later. So, consistency in a race.

Hadjar himself is also proud of how quickly he can adapt to new conditions—a quality for which his new teammate Verstappen has been praised for years. Pressed further on that, it becomes clear how much of an impression Hadjar has already made in this area.

“What stood out immediately with Isack is his ability to be quick right away on a new circuit—and, really, with a new car as well. Let’s not forget the car is relatively new to him," says Hamelin.

Hadjar may well be a quick adaptor, which is just as well, for history shows us that drivers have a limited time to impress once they are paired against Verstappen.

Listen to the latest episode of F1 TODAY featuring an in-depth review of the first test week in Bahrain.