Verstappen and Hadjar’s slipstream in Belgium
Max Verstappen was one of the protagonists of the Belgian GP qualifying. The four-time world champion managed to secure second position thanks also to the work of Isack Hadjar, tasked by Red Bull with offering him a decisive slipstream in Q3 at Spa-Francorchamps. The French driver, penalized on the grid for replacing power unit components, played a fundamental strategic role, allowing Verstappen to secure a position that, for the Dutch champion, would have been impossible to achieve.
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Giving a slipstream is never a simple maneuver. And even more so in today’s F1, where the theme of artificial intelligence is central, to the point of making us wonder if drivers are still drivers or have become AI passengers.
Hadjar’s words
Hadjar experienced this dynamic firsthand last Saturday: “It was very difficult. The difficulty lies in trying to understand and guess what the engine will give you. Once you stop at the exit of turn 14 and deliver power, the engine is a bit confused because you stopped for no reason, and the software is also disoriented“.
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In the first time attack in Q3, Hadjar had too much power and pulled away from Verstappen. In the second lap, the Frenchman didn’t have enough power, and so Super Max caught up with him long before the Bus Stop.
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