RacingAfter just three Grands Prix with Red Bull, Isack Hadjar outqualified Max Verstappen at Suzuka. Team principal Laurent Mekies points to a simple reason for the rookie’s early punch at circuits like Melbourne and Japan. Hadjar has moved his life to England, planted himself near Milton Keynes, and spent most days buried in the simulator.
Mekies said the 19-year-old’s routine is not for show. In early-season comments, he called it “pure passion and admirable dedication,” noting Hadjar even flew back to the factory between Bahrain tests to log extra simulator sessions. The team sees him at the campus almost every day. That volume of work, Mekies argues, is already converting into feel for the RB22 that you usually only get after a full season.
The signs are on the timing screens. Hadjar qualified P3 in Melbourne on debut for Red Bull. He banked his first F1 points with the team in China. Then came Suzuka, where he outqualified Verstappen in their third weekend as teammates. It is an early run that lands in the right places for a driver in only his second F1 season and his first inside a title-winning organization.
Context matters. The RB22 has not been easy to unlock. The car has a narrow operating window, with limited aerodynamic balance that makes setup choices sensitive and confidence hard to build. Power-unit reliability has also bitten, which has cost mileage and clean practice runs. Under the current regulations, finding lap time through development is tough and demands careful trade-offs. Against that backdrop, Hadjar’s bursts of speed stand out inside the garage because they come without a fully settled platform.
Mekies is pushing patience on the comparisons, especially the Verstappen ones. He points to Max’s decade in Formula 1 and four world titles as the difference in reference points. The two drivers often report the same balance trends from the RB22. Verstappen tends to connect those feelings straight to root causes in setup or aero behavior. Hadjar, as Mekies explains, is still speaking more in sensations than solutions, which makes sense given his mileage. The team sees that evolution week by week as his simulator notes begin to match what the car does on Friday.
For now, Red Bull is leaning into the process. Hadjar keeps turning laps in Milton Keynes, then carrying that rhythm to circuits like Albert Park, Shanghai, and Suzuka. The RB22 asks a lot from its drivers. Mekies believes Hadjar’s way of answering is already clear, and the early impact is exactly what his workload suggested might come.