Photo: Red Bull
Pepe Marti says the ongoing support from both Formula 1 driver Isack Hadjar and Red Bull “means a lot” to him following a “complete disaster” of a rookie Formula 2 season.
Marti stormed to victory in the Bahrain sprint race, with a last lap overtake on Joshua Duerksen securing him victory, and had his former Campos Racing team-mate turned Racing Bulls F1 driver Hadjar there to congratulate him post race.
“He’s a great guy and I’m really happy to see that he’s doing so well in Formula 1,” Marti told media including Formula Scout afterwards.
“He was a great team-mate to me. Even when he was fighting for wins and I was fighting for some points, he was always really like, ‘trust in your talent’ because in the end he knows me since karting, we fought in Formula Regional and in a lot of different championships, and we were always on par with one another.”
Having signed for the Red Bull Junior Team two years ago, Marti is looking to follow in his friend’s footsteps and step up to F1.
“Last season was a complete disaster,” lamented Marti. “It means a lot them [Red Bull] putting their trust in me.”
“It pushes me to say they trust me because I have the talent to do what I’m doing and to do a race like this one. I’m hoping I can make this race a standard for my performance and that I can also build this kind of performance into qualifying.
“[That] is what’s keeping me behind from fighting for the top three and four in every single race. I don’t think my issue is a lack of race pace I think its a matter of on the last lap [of qualifying] putting it all together. If I can work on that I think I can be a championship contender.
“As a team we have done a really good job. Red Bull and Campos have worked together a bit to try to extract the most out of this new machinery and for them to be supporting me again this year means a lot, and they’ve helped me a lot in my growth as a driver.”
Expanding further on last year’s struggles, Marti feels that he quickly adapted to F2 to be competitive in Bahrain and Jeddah last year, but that he “went against what the car wanted”.
“It was all a matter more of how I directed what I was learning,” he said. “I think I just took it all in the wrong way and I went against what the car wanted and from Qatar onwards I was, back on pace close to Isack and obviously in Abu Dhabi we ended up really, really well.
“So it’s just how I put my feelings and my experience back to use and it’s very pleasing to get started with good results. In Australia we also did quite a decent comeback, so I’m hoping to build on this.”