It’s been a week to forget for Ollie Bearman. After crashing out yesterday, his Haas required a power unit replacement before the first Grand Prix of the season had even begun. Then, to make matters worse, Saturday’s practice session ended before it started when he beached his car in the gravel. It’s been a brutal start for the young rookie.
The Haas driver impressed massively last year when he stepped in for Carlos Sainz in Saudi Arabia. After very little practice, the Briton finished his race in P7, only four places behind Charles Leclerc. That year he was able to step into a car two more times. It’s safe to say expectations were high for the rookie this year, but so far, he’s barely had enough seat time to impress.
During FP1, Bearman lost the rear of his car before slamming into the wall on the exit. The impact caused substantial damage to his Haas machinery, with both the gearbox and power unit taking a hit. While the power unit was eventually replaced, the extent of the damage meant FP2 was little more than a lost cause.
Oliver Bearman, Haas F1 Team
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
FP3 was to be his moment of redemption, but his first fast lap quickly came to an end when he dropped a tire into the grass on the entry to Turn 11. He ended up stranded in the gravel.
Adding insult to injury, qualifying brought a mechanical issue with him radioing the situation through to his engineer, complaining of a gearbox issue. He willed his Haas back to the pits.
Following his Q1 exit, he said the following:
“Yeah, I mean, pretty unforgiving circuit and you know, two seemingly small errors giving big consequences and missing out on all of my running clumsiness from my side to make these errors, honestly, and that’s not good enough.
“And then of course the gearbox issue and the qualifying pretty much sums up what we’ve had so far.”
Asked about his FP3 exit, he admits to the pressure he’s put on his team.
“Yeah, I just dipped a wheel on the grass. There’s a long season ahead of us, I’m not gonna get down about two days in a very long season. I think as a team we’re struggling a bit more than we anticipated and more than we looked in Bahrain, so you know we’ve got a bit of work to do on that side of things on pure car performance and, of course, I haven’t helped out very much because the team’s pretty much running with one car.”
Bearman admits the American team is lacking “pure performance”.
“Obviously I haven’t done enough laps to really feel what the car is handling like.
“I can only tell you from Esteban’s comments, but yeah, just on pure lap time we’re not that strong.”
Bearman will start at the very back of the grid tomorrow.
