Although it’s a tired journalistic cliche to greet the announcement of a driver’s contract as ‘no surprise’, it was especially true of Oliver Bearman’s confirmation at Haas.
Bearman made a serious impression on the team with his performance and professionalism during his two appearances for them in practice sessions at the end of 2023. This year, the stars aligned for him perfectly to secure a full-time drive.
First Carlos Sainz Jnr went down with appendicitis at Jeddah and Ferrari called Bearman up to make his debut in his place. An F1 rookie in a Ferrari is a rare sight, and the fact the Scuderia entrusted him with one of their cars when they might easily have called up a known quantity like Antonio Giovinazzi was a strong signal they consider him the real deal.
Everyone got to see why they rated him so highly when he got behind the wheel of an SF-24. Despite missing Friday’s practice running he was quickly on the pace in his sole hour in the car, then came within four-hundredths of a second of beating Lewis Hamilton to the final place in Q3. On race day he proved a safe pair of hands and worked his way forward to score a fine seventh place, having put both Hamilton and Lando Norris behind him.
That alone raised expectations Ferrari would place him at their customer team next year. When it emerged Nico Hulkenberg would leave Haas to join Sauber at the end of this year, the timing couldn’t have been more perfect for Bearman. His latest F2 campaign may have been no great shakes, last week’s win notwithstanding, but that hardly matters against the quality of his performances in F1 machinery.
But as one driver arrives another must inevitably leave, at least until F1 sees fit to allow an 11th team in, which they remain unfathomably hostile towards. Who will therefore have to move aside to make way for Bearman?
Unusually there are already two drivers on the grid who know they won’t be at their current teams next year and have not confirmed their next destination yet. Carlos Sainz Jnr and Esteban Ocon are both race-winners as well, and therefore more highly coveted.
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On top of that, Hulkenberg’s impending move to the-team-soon-to-be-known-as-Audi must leave either Valtteri Bottas or Zhou Guanyu Looking for employment next year. In the former’s case, that means potentially another race-winner on the market.
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