Photos: Red Bull Content Pool
Campos Racing’s engineers have painted their picture of Isack Hadjar to Formula Scout after he openly admitted that his chemistry with the team has largely contributed to his stellar 2024 F2 campaign
In the era of Formula 2’s new car, the most successful combination so far has been Red Bull junior Isack Hadjar and his Campos Racing team. The Franco-Spanish alliance has won four of the 10 feature races this season, and been on the podium’s other steps in two of the others. Those results have meant Hadjar is spending his summer break with a 36-point championship lead over Invicta Racing’s Gabriel Bortoleto. Thanks additionally to his team-mate Pepe Marti’s double podium in the opening round, Campos is tied on 203 points with Invicta at the top of the teams’ table.
The year started slowly for Hadjar amid mechanical failures and accidents out of his control. After the first two rounds, there was a feeling of frustration in his side of the Campos garage because they weren’t maximising their speed. However, their fortune soon changed and the season ramped up with successive feature race wins in Melbourne and at Imola. In rounds eight and 10 at Silverstone and Spa-Francorchamps he achieved the same, and he not only has twice as many wins as anyone else this year but a tally of feature race triumphs that was last bettered by Charles Leclerc in 2017.
Hadjar also claimed his maiden F2 pole, on his 21st attempt, at Silverstone. He has significantly improved on the results from his rookie season with Hitech GP, when he achieved a best finish of third in the Red Bull Ring sprint race and scored 55 points across 13 rounds. This year he already has 165 points.
The 19-year-old has repeatedly stated since the beginning of this season that the bond created with Campos has played a key role to his form. Also, the fact that the team’s set-up direction has led to him having a fast car at every circuit has increased his confidence round after round with a chassis that everyone is still learning.
But the attention on Hadjar this year has sometimes not been on results that are the envy of his rivals, but on his demeanour with the media and some of the comments he has made to them when results haven’t, and even have, gone his way.
Mertens and Hadjar
Therefore, Formula Scout spoke with Hadjar’s race engineer Jose Fontestad and performance engineer Gabriel Mertens to learn more about the F2 sophomore and his progress.
Mertens didn’t hesitate when it came to describing his driver, calling him “talented, professional and mentally strong”, while Fontestad said “he is among the best I have seen in terms of race pace”. Those words definitely tally with the feature race results.
“He is also very good on hitting the ground running and with all the procedures,” followed Fontestad. “For some reason last year it was not easy for him and I think he lost some confidence which he is recovering little by little this year. He is a funny authentic person and the team is enjoying a lot working with him. But when it is time to work he is very professional.
“Being in the [Red Bull] academy has for sure many positives as you can learn from very successful people in many areas of motorsport, they have been the benchmark for some time. There is of course high pressure involved but it will become a performance enhancer on the good ones.”
“He has always been very professional, from is everyday habits to his work, and is very well trained physically,” Mertens rounded off.
Both engineers touched on the driver’s acclimation to the team and ensured that it had been a straightforward process with Hadjar.
“As a Spanish team it’s quite natural for us to be welcoming, the atmosphere within the team is great, and the drivers feel it,” Mertens said. “But of course it’s not enough, working on the preparation of each event and on driver weakness is key and nothing is left to chance. He’s improving every time, he feels it, gains confidence and as it translates into results. That’s the only thing that matters in the end and what makes a driver happy.”
Fontestad keeping Hadjar in the zone
“At the end of the day everyone performs at his best in different environments,” Fontestad added. “The way we work at Campos is at the same time very professional and quite easy-going. We try to bring the drivers close to us so they can express themselves in a honest way, in this way they will push us also to keep improving.
“We didn’t change our way of working from previous seasons. We try to analyse the things and then we try to improve on the negatives both from the driver and the team side.”
The one-lap pace was soon identified as an area to be improved, which led them to “work on all the aspects involved on delivering good qualifying laps” in the words of Fontestad. And it paid off because the Red Bull junior has been in the top three in six of the 10 qualifying sessions this year, and only once outside of the top 10. It was at Barcelona, where he was 11th fastest and he took the blame for it. Nevertheless, he recovered in the races to finish in sixth and fifth. Hadjar’s race engineer also affirmed that he takes all the lessons he can from previous events “becoming a stronger package in every aspect”.
“During his first test with us in Abu Dhabi [in December 2023] we were very impressed by his race pace, but his performance over one lap had margin for improvement,” Mertens explained. “We’ve worked extensively during winter, before each race in the simulator and has done very good improvements in that aspect.”
Despite being only eighth fastest in Jeddah, Mertens labelled the qualifying session in round two of the season as Hadjar’s performance that most impressed the team — a testimonial to the work done over the winter.
“It’s a track where you need to build up your pace progressively through free practice and qualifying, but he couldn’t run in FP due to an issue. Going straight to quali and doing a top 10 less than three tenths [of a second] from pole with such a tight field was very impressive from his side. But the work between sessions was the usual, maybe working a bit more on the driving side and making sure he would be confident on the car balance.”
Track walks with Fontestad and Mertens
On the question of who is more talkative in briefings and debriefs, Mertens exclaims: “Well, we are Spanish so we will always speak more!”
It’s a contrast also evident when Hadjar’s Spanish team-mate Marti is present in press conferences after making the podium, although it’s understandable that with frequent wins there’s less for Hadjar to say in such sessions that he hasn’t already said.
“His ideas and propositions are always clear, so conversations are straightforward. Most of the time we are on the same page so he follows our proposals, but he has any question or alternative idea he doesn’t hesitate,” adds Mertens.
But Fontestad feels “it’s 50-50” in taking the vocal lead when working with Hadjar. “Usually, he is quite right on the things that are more important, so we are most of the times agreeing on them. But he is also open to listen and try the things that make sense from our point of view.”
Hadjar’s nerve has featured in several transmissions this year, especially when the on-track action was not going his way. Monaco’s feature race cool down lap is an example of it, as a miscommunication resulted in him missing out on another potential victory. Also at the Hungaroring, where a timing mistake leaving the pitlane for the feature race denied him the third place on the grid he had earned himself in qualifying. However, his engineers have downplayed what has been broadcasted, and reckoned that if managed correctly such an attitude can become a positive going forward.
“I think it is more a perception from the outside than the real thing,” affirmed Fontestad. “He of course can sound very direct and hot-headed sometimes, but it is a consequence of how much it means for him, a sign of his energy. He is getting better on managing these situations and he knows that it will lead to improve his performances.
“I don’t see many negatives as far as it is not affecting his performance. That is the way he is. He never goes into personal comments, so all good.”
Hadjar and Bortoleto [10] in Jeddah
Mertens added: “His approach is always clear and concise, for us it’s a positive point as it makes the work with him more effective. On radio he is calm most of the time, but he has his moments in hot situations, as most drivers do. TV broadcast focus mainly on those moments and it gives him quite an unfair image. It’s a point where he can do better, but he has already done big improvements on that aspect.”
Only time will tell whether Hadjar and Campos will be crowned F2 champions at the end of 2024. But it’s clear they’ve laid the foundations to achieve it.
The Frenchman himself recognised there is still way to go with four rounds remaining, but they are on the right path.
“It’s the best way to go in the summer break, that’s for sure,” he told media including Formula Scout after his most recent win at Spa. “It’s [36] points in F2. He [Bortoleto] can have an amazing weekend and I have a poor one and then the fight is on again. So we can’t really rely on that and we must keep doing what we do, which is maximise every opportunity. And that’s what we did today. So I’m happy.”
Being a Red Bull junior in his position, Hadjar’s name obviously comes up in conversations regarding candidacy for a 2025 Formula 1 seat. RB is yet to confirm drivers, and Sergio Perez’s performances at Red Bull Racing are under continual scrutiny.
Hadjar has definitely earned himself the right to be considered for a drive at single-seaters’ top level with his performances. And historically it would have been a very on-brand move for Red Bull to pluck him out of F2 during this gap in the racing schedule and hand him an F1 debut. The company doesn’t work that way anymore, meaning it’s even hard to predict how much of a contender he is for a 2025 seat.
Asked by media about his F1 chances after taking part in free practice at Silverstone for Red Bull Racing, he didn’t hold back.
“I want to say I’m as ready as I can. It’s obviously a huge step, but I feel like if I’m doing right in F2 and I’m there and I’m fighting for the title, then F1 is definitely on the cards. And I’ll be ready for the call, that’s for sure.”