Red Bull Racing will field two rookie drivers during the F1 season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez will both be sidelined for the opening hour of running with Jake Dennis and Isack Hadjar set to step into the RB19s.
It comes as the world championship-winning team fulfils its obligation to field a ‘rookie’ driver in each of its cars on at least one occasion.
Five teams took that opportunity in Mexico City with Hadjar there in action for Scuderia AlphaTauri in what was his first experience of F1 machinery.
He was joined on track by Jack Doohan (Alpine), Theo Pourchaire (Sauber), Frederik Vesti (Mercedes), and Oliver Bearman (Haas).
“We’re obviously planning to do that in Abu Dhabi, in the last standard race of the year and a circuit we’ve got quite a bit of data on,” Red Bull boss Christian Horner said when asked about his plans for rookie drivers.
“That first session in Abu Dhabi tends to have not a great deal of set-up value, so that’s where we’re going to elect to put both rookie drivers in our cars.
“Jake Dennis is going to be driving one of the cars, and Isack will be in the other car, so it was good to see him put in a strong performance with [Scuderia AlphaTauri] today,” he added.
Hadjar is part of the Red Bull junior programme and has been competing in Formula 2 this season.
His Free Practice 1 outing in Mexico City was well received by Scuderia AlphaTauri boss Franz Tost as he ended the hour 17th.
“We were impressed by him,” Tost said.
“He was calm, he went out with three different sets of tyres; prototype tyre, medium and soft, and with all these different compounds we saw that he really did a good job.
“His technical feedback was also quite good because if you compare it to the data there’s a very high correlation.
“We were really impressed and I think that he will be soon driving in Formula 1.”
Dennis is the team’s development driver, a role he’s held since 2018.
The 28-year-old’s racing programme has largely focused on GT cars, though in recent seasons has switched to Formula E, winning the 2022-23 championship with Andretti.
He has previously performed testing duties and was in action at the Hungaroring as recently as August.
