Bearman identifies biggest weakness ahead of F1 debut season

Oliver Bearman believes his biggest weakness ahead of his full-season debut in F1 is his qualifying pace.

The Briton has signed to race with Haas for the 2025 campaign and will compete alongside Esteben Ocon, who joins from Haas.

Bearman has already made his grand prix debut, standing in for Carlos Sainz earlier this year at Ferrari – he is continuing to prepare for his first full season with further FP1 outings with Haas this season.

As he continues to build experience, the 19-year-old admitted he finds his one-lap pace in F1 machinery is lacking.

“There are a lot of areas, you can’t identify all of them in just one session,” Bearman told media including RacingNews365 when asked where he needs to improve. 

“Generally, my qualifying pace has been on the weaker side of things. But I think I’ve said this for the last three or four sessions now. 

“It’s taking small steps, but in the end I always feel like if I did a second set of tyres, it would be fine.

“It’s just making that step from a hard tyre or a medium on a soft with lower fuel and qualifying [engine] power.

“It’s quite a big step and I don’t tend to make it yet. But by the same token, it’s just a free practice one session and there’s no need to take any risk.”