Isack Hadjar has already sent his first message as a Red Bull driver: he hit the track early in Montmeló and set the fastest time of the day. With public backing from Mekies and a team desperate to find a partner for Verstappen, the Frenchman came out swinging in 2026.
Isack Hadjar didn’t need many laps to start making noise at Red Bull. On the opening day of the first Formula 1 tests in Barcelona, the French driver was the first to hop into the RB22 at the Montmeló circuit and ended the morning as the fastest of the seven cars that ran. The benchmark was emphatic: a 1:18.452, two seconds quicker than the second-best time, set by Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes).
That’s no small detail, especially given the context. Red Bull heads into 2026 with a clear priority: finally solving the second-seat problem once and for all. Because Max Verstappen can carry the team with his performance, but over a long season with razor-thin margins, he needs a teammate who can deliver big points and help fight every weekend.
In that scenario, Laurent Mekies didn’t mince words when explaining why the team chose Hadjar. “We need to do a better job with the second car... there’s no easy solution, it’s a complex equation we’re facing that way. I think Isack brings pure speed,” said the Red Bull Racing boss.
And he didn’t stop there. Mekies also highlighted how the Frenchman began his previous stint at Racing Bulls, placing him on a high level right from the start: “We believe the level he started last season with, his initial speed, was exceptional... on par with the best, but we also believe that the great ones, the champions, don’t just have an incredible starting point—they keep improving.”
That confidence is rooted in that growth. According to Mekies, Hadjar showed clear signs of progress as the races went on: “It’s not just progression in maturity or in conversations with the engineers; in fact, they get faster. You get to the fifth or tenth race and they start doing something with the car they hadn’t done before, and we saw that with Isack last year at Racing Bulls. We’re convinced he has enormous potential,” he said on James Allen’s F1 podcast.
Red Bull decided to promote him for 2026 after Hadjar finished ahead of Yuki Tsunoda and Liam Lawson in the drivers’ standings, scoring 51 points. A statistical boost that ultimately tipped the scales in a part of the team that had been building up frustration.
The “second car” story has recent chapters that explain the urgency. In December 2024, Red Bull let go of Sergio “Checo” Pérez after a disappointing year in which he finished eighth and the team lost the constructors’ title. In 2025, they first tried Lawson, but replaced him after just two races. Then Tsunoda came in, but the situation still didn’t improve.
Now it’s a different bet. And at least on Day 1 in Barcelona, Hadjar already sent a clear message: at Red Bull, he wants to kick off the 2026 era from the front.