Sainz’s ‘fighting for your life’ admission after Hadjar accusation

Scrapping for his “life” in qualifying, Carlos Sainz insists he’s not playing games with his rivals despite accusations from Isack Hadjar, nor does he believe his rivals are “mean” enough to play games with him.

Sometimes, though, it can get a “bit cheeky”.

Carlos Sainz: A bit cheeky, but never mean

Racing Bulls driver Hadjar was fuming with Sainz after qualifying for the Italian Grand Prix where he accused the Spaniard of wrecking his outlap in Q1.

Hounded by Sainz on his outlap in the dying moments of Q1, Hadjar went on to have a moment at Lesmo 2 on his final lap and blamed Sainz.

“He was just super annoying on the outlap. He was not going to push anyway,” he told PlanetF1.com and other media outlets

“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.”

But according to Sainz, he was just trying to do his own thing to ensure he made it into Q2. It had nothing to do with Hadjar, and everything to do with Williams’ tyre prep issues.

“You know you’re fighting for your life there,” Sainz told PlanetF1.com and other media outlets in the build-up to the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend.

“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.

“I struggle to believe the driver has the headspace and the time ‘I have a Williams behind, or even slower than if I penalise myself’ is going a step too far.

“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.”

Carlos Sainz v Alex Albon: Williams F1 2025 head-to-head stats

👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between team-mates

👉 F1 2025: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates

Needing to push is an issue that the former Ferrari driver has had with his tyre preparation at Williams, saying it has probably been his “biggest headache” this season.

However, even swapping between compounds has been an issue for Williams according to the Spaniard.

“It’s very puzzling how much we’ve struggled this year,” Sainz said. “Probably my biggest headache of the year has been getting the tyres to work, because I’ve been quick with the car pretty much from the get-go at the beginning of the year.

“Both Alex and I feel relatively comfortable with a car pretty much every weekend. We only have these weaknesses where there is very long, medium speed corner where we know we’re going to be weak, but everywhere else, the car is relatively competitive.

“The only problem that we have is this randomness of tyre prep and that we get in certain tracks. Sometimes it’s not even tyre preparation. It’s how much a new tyre changes the balance of the car, and even if the tyre is working well, we are slower with a new soft tyre than with a used medium tyre, and we don’t know why.

“And it’s not always tyre prep. It’s just our car has a weakness with, first of all, tyre preparation, but also the balance that a new tyre offers to the car. And sometimes we are not as quick on the first timed lap of the tyre as we should be. So it’s two different topics.

“In the end, it brings you to a same point that is extracting maximum lap time of the first time lap of the soft tyre, which is what you’re forced to do in quali.

“Sometimes it’s one thing, like tyre prep, but in places like Austria, remember the tyre ready, but it didn’t offer us a good balance and good performance in the first time.”

Williams is fifth in the Constructors’ Championship on 86 points, 24 ahead of Aston Martin.

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