Carlos Sainz responded to Isack Hadjar's "cheeky" radio message during the qualifying session at Monza for the 2025 F Italian GP earlier this month. The two racers had a close contest during Q1, and Hadjar blamed Sainz for wrecking his lap.
The Italian GP was not a very beneficial one for Hadjar, who had just registered his first podium in Zandvoort prior to that race. He did not make it out of Q1 and kicked off the race from P16. However, on the team radio, he blamed Carlos Sainz, saying that he had to compromise his lap, after which he could not set another competitive one in the dying stages of Q1.
"He was just super annoying on the outlap. He was not going to push anyway," he said (via PlanetF1). "I don’t know why he was fighting so hard for track position and then just let me by on my lap, so I compromised the outlap for nothing."
However, these statements were a bit "cheeky," according to Carlos Sainz. Saying to the media ahead of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, he said that Hadjar did not know what he was trying to get the most from his outlap to get locked into Q2, which he did manage to do, starting the race in P13.
"I don’t believe other drivers are that mean, a bit cheeky, but the mean… everyone is so nervous in those last rounds of Q1 and everyone’s fighting for themselves," Sainz said.
He added:
"But yeah, I think going back to last week, Isack misinterpreted the run plan that I was doing. I don’t think Isack was understanding what I was doing."
"I think he thought I was just playing around with him because I wanted to open the lap in front of him, and when in reality, I was never going to fight for the position. I was just pushing like crazy to get my outlap and make it to the front."
Sainz moved to Williams Racing this season after Ferrari replaced him with Lewis Hamilton. The Spanish racer has been giving quite a few consistent results, helping the side collect the most points they have scored in the past five seasons.