By 
Isack Hadjar began his first full season at Red Bull knowing that the last driver in the same position as him lasted just two rounds before being booted out.
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That must have been a daunting prospect to contemplate, though it bears pointing out that the senior race team management has changed significantly at Red Bull since Liam Lawson was shown the door after his pair of starts for the team last year.
The more experienced Yuki Tsunoda took Lawson’s place and became the latest in a series of drivers whose reputations took a brutal battering from occupying the garage adjacent to Max Verstappen’s. Tsunoda mustered just 7.2% of Red Bull’s points while alongside Verstappen.
This is the context in which to assess Hadjar’s performance this year. His 8-2 deficit in qualifying is nothing to brag about but he has been much closer to Verstappen over a single flying lap than his predecessors.
Hadjar has done vastly better at collecting points, too, claiming 38% of Red Bull’s score so far. True, compared to Tsunoda he’s had the benefit of a wider field spread between Red Bull and the midfield, but even so he’s already taken more than twice as many points as Tsunoda managed over his 22-race stint at the team last year.
He has achieved this alongside a formidable talent in a car which both drivers have termed “undriveable” on occasions. While the high level Verstappen operates at is so familiar it can almost be taken for granted (his superb second place in Hungary, for example), Hadjar has done a more than respectable job alongside him so far.
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| AUS | CHI | JAP | MIA | CAN | MON | SPA | AUT | GBR | BEL | HUN | ||
| Verstappen | Q | |||||||||||
| R |
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Unrepresentative comparisons omitted. Negative value: Verstappen was faster; Positive value: Hadjar was faster
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