Hadjar says Ferrari had the fastest car in Singapore

Red Bull driver Isack Hadjar said Ferrari had the fastest car at the Singapore Grand Prix and argued Max Verstappen would have won by a larger margin if he had been driving a Ferrari. His comparison was a personal assessment, not a measured conclusion about the teams’ performance. Verstappen won the race ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, finishing 7.335 seconds in front. Hadjar said Red Bull’s car remained difficult to drive and that Verstappen had made the most of the opportunities available to him. He pointed to Verstappen’s qualifying performance and Ferrari’s lack of new soft tyres during the race as factors in the result. Leclerc rejected Hadjar’s hypothetical comparison when asked about it in Austin. He said Hadjar did not know what Ferrari’s car was like, just as Leclerc did not know Red Bull’s, and called the comparison unfounded. The remarks underline that the drivers’ views do not establish how Verstappen would have performed in a different car. McLaren driver Oscar Piastri offered a more qualified assessment of the teams’ pace. He said Red Bull had made a significant step forward over recent races and had become the most consistently quick car, while Ferrari had...