Piastri sees Red Bull ahead – Hadjar disagrees: "Not the fastest car"
After Verstappen's wins in Malaysia and Singapore, McLaren's Piastri rates Red Bull as the most consistently quick car. Team-mate Hadjar is cautious, saying the car remains hard to drive.
Photo: Liauzh / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0 (cropped and resized)
Video: YouTube · FORMULA 1 · youtube.com
Max Verstappen has won the last two races in Malaysia and Singapore – and for Oscar Piastri that makes Red Bull the benchmark heading into the United States Grand Prix. "I think over the last few weeks Red Bull has definitely become, I would say, the most consistently quick car," the McLaren driver said in Austin, according to the FIA transcript. Red Bull "definitely took a pretty big step forwards over the last triple header", he added, while Ferrari "lose on all the straights".
Verstappen's team-mate Isack Hadjar sees it differently. "No. I don't think we have the fastest car," the Frenchman said, according to Formula1.com. "I think the car is still very hard to drive." In Singapore, Ferrari had the quickest car: "I think if you put Max in the Ferrari, he would have won the race with more margin." Hadjar himself had to start the Singapore race from the pit lane after power unit changes and finished tenth.
In the drivers' standings Verstappen is fourth on 221 points, 119 behind leader Kimi Antonelli. In the constructors' championship, just seven points separate McLaren (339) and Red Bull (332) in the fight for third behind Mercedes (578) and Ferrari (444). Piastri is seventh on 138 points, Hadjar eighth on 97.