Lawson and Hadjar on a "crazy" season and "shooting zombies"

Axed after just two races for Red Bull, Lawson was demoted to their junior team Racing Bulls (for whom he impressed in his 11 outings last year) alongside Hadjar for last weekend's Grand Prix in Japan, with Yuki Tsunoda replacing him as Max Verstappen's teammate.

"Obviously it's been a crazy couple of weeks and months and a lot of it has been not the most enjoyable," confessed the 23-year-old New Zealander.

With the temperature gauge at the Sakhir circuit nudging 37 degrees Celsius it was nothing like the heat he felt at Red Bull after two pointless performances in Australia and China.

Mentally it's been a tough start to his first full season in the fast lane, but Lawson was taking solace in still being able to do his day job: "The fact that I'm racing each weekend at the moment is probably the best thing for me because it just means I can focus on driving.

Lawson finished P17 in Suzuka last Sunday on his return to Racing Bulls, with 20-year-old rookie teammate Isack Hadjar picking up his first ever F1 points in eighth, but vows there is better to come: "I think the weekend (in Japan) didn't really show properly what I think we were capable of. Unfortunately, we just missed out on qualification, but in general, I think I felt pretty comfortable."

Bahrain is the middle leg of a 'triple header', book-ended by Japan and the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in Jeddah.

Lawson feels that hectic schedule has helped him avoid dwelling too much on what has been a tough start to 2025: "I think that's the best thing, had it been a three-week gap or something like that, you're just sitting on it and although you don't want to talk about it, it ends up coming up in conversation and at least this way because we are racing, I have enough to think about."

Lawson's teammate Hadjar had a baptism of fire in the season-opener in Australia, crashing out on the formation lap. But the talented French rookie dusted himself down to finish 11th next time out in China, followed by last Sunday's deeply impressive eighth spot after qualifying seventh.

Whilst understandably thrilled to get his first points of his career on the board Hadjar said it came with a twist: "Of course now being rewarded with points definitely gives me a bit more confidence but it's not like I don't need to work anymore, you know? I always put the pressure on me to keep delivering, so now the expectations from people are maybe a bit higher, but I keep doing what I do."

Hadjar and Lawson have been gelling as teammates off the track, with the Parisian raised to an Algerian family describing the pair's chemistry as "really good" revealing: "We played padel, we went to virtual Call of Duty together. Like two days ago, we were shooting zombies together in the same team" he disclosed.

Hadjar received praise after his Suzuka drive from Red Bull's influential advisor Helmut Marko. That led to the big question: Would he answer the call if and when it came to becoming four-time world champion Verstappen's latest partner - a position that does not come with a lot of job security?

Hadjar said: "Honestly, now it seems like it's really hard to be next to Max. It makes me want to go even more, to find out why, what's going on, but that's still the main target."

Both young drivers will be out to impress in this fourth round of the season held under floodlights on Sunday evening.