For Isack Hadjar, his F1 career must at times feel like a Lightning McQueen adventure from the Cars films, the character he loved as a toddler. Think about it: a dreadful debut in Melbourne, where less than a year ago he slid off on the formation lap, to a promotion to Red Bull as the next challenger to Max Verstappen.
It can all happen very quickly. Who can forget Hadjar’s tears after his unfortunate crash on the formation lap for the Australian GP, Antony Hamilton — Lewis Hamilton’s father — offering a consoling shoulder in the paddock, and Helmut Marko’s brutal reaction not long after. The Austrian labelled Hadjar’s tears “a bit embarrassing.”
Hadjar (21) later on that moment: “It was painful, I agreed with him. Afterwards he told me it could have happened to anyone. He wasn’t angry. ‘Next time will be better,’ was his message.”
‘No joke’
As with Verstappen, Marko runs like a constant thread through Hadjar’s career. It was Marko, in his role as head of the Red Bull junior programme, who offered the young Frenchman of Algerian roots a contract in 2021. It happened in a manner typical of Marko, Hadjar remembers. Few words. Right after his win in a race in Monaco for the Formula Regional European Championship, his then-manager got a call saying Marko wanted to meet. “I told my manager to get lost, because I thought he was joking. But he insisted it was true and then I realised it wasn’t a joke. I asked: when? Now!”
They couldn’t get a taxi, so the two sprinted through the pouring rain to the hotel where Marko was staying. “We arrived completely soaked. Helmut was waiting in the lobby. We sat down and actually it was all very simple. He looked at me and said, ‘I’ll send you a contract. That’s it.’ I thought it was a bit strange at the time, but later I understood. That’s how it works.”
