Bearman set for race ban. – Oliver Bearman escapes one race ban for now – Haas F1 driver Oliver Bearman is walking a tightrope given he is sitting on ten F1 driver penalty points with twelve being an automatic race ban. Ironically Bearman was the last driver to benefit from another being banned as he stood in for Kevin Magnussen for Haas last season at the Italian Grand Prix in Monza.
Yet unlike Magnussen who is known for his aggressive driving style, Oliver’s travels which have been punished by the stewards are defined by a lack of experience. His first points which will expire after the Mexican Grand Prix were issued in Saudi Arabia Paulo for a collision with Franco Colapinto in the second practice session (2pts).
The came Monaco this year and the British driver overtook Carlos Sainz under a red flag and was slammed by race control (2pts.) Again in Silverstone it was another red flag incident which attracted the attention of the stewards as Bearman did a racing pit entry in wet conditions and under the red flag. The result? He crashed heavily (4pts).
Bearman silly errors proven costly
Oli was punished again at Monza for causing a collision with Carlos Sainz (2pts). He now sits precariously on ten points with a further two seeing him suffer a race weekend ban. During the Sprint race in Austin this weekend, barmen found himself in a titanic battle with the far superior Mercedes driver by fellow rookie Kimi Antonelli.
The Haas driver despite his inferior tools, put up a great fight and a spectacle for the fans has he went wheel to wheel with the Italian. Yet the inevitable was to come to pass as Antonelli made a brave attack up the inside of turn 14 and his car was alongside at the apex of the corner.
Under the FIA’s F1 driving standards guidelines, this means the driver making the move is entitled to the corner and crucially does not have to leave space for their rival. Whilst Antonelli didn’t push Bearman outside of track limits it was the only place he could go to avoid a Collins – but the margin of transgression was small – yet Bearman retained his position ahead of the Mercedes driver.
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Haas dither over driver instruction
Despite replays suggesting Bearman had left the track and gained an advantage, Haas F1 appeared to dither in telling their driver to relinquish his position for three laps. Then out came the safety car on lap 17 which remained at the head of the snake of cars to the finish and the opportunity was gone although the stewards were already investigating the transgression.
The stewards awarded the Haas driver a ten second penalty which dropped him from the final Sprint points paying position to the back of the field. Yet crucially he was not awarded any penalty points, which Bearman admits for a while he feared.
“I don’t know what you guys thought, but I felt pretty hard done by this morning,” Bearman told written media in an FIA press session. “Actually, I thought I had a race ban for a minute, so I was really, really annoyed. Obviously, with everything that happened, I had a bit of fire in me.”
The British driver made it plain he disagreed with the stewards decision to penalise him although he stopped short of further FIA punishment by refraining from “saying things that I shouldn’t” regarding the standard of stewarding.
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Haas had three laps to act
Bearman argues the time was too short for the Haas team to analyse whether he should hand back the place, yet the process for punishing the driver begin swiftly. An offence is first “noted” by race control and the outcome will either be “no further action” or that “the stewards are investigating…”
There was a resulting safety car which was deployed due to Lance Stroll T-boning Bearman’s Haas team mate Esteban Ocon. “From our view at the time, we didn’t have a long time to really think about it, because the safety car came out directly,” he suggested. “But from where I’m sitting, it’s really marginal,” Bearman insisted.
“Like I said, I think back about that 10-page document [driving guidelines] in those two-tenths of a second that he sent it on my inside and couldn’t quite figure out exactly where he was relative to my mirror or whatever. So, you know, I leave it to the team to decide that. But I think by the time they were ready to make a decision, the safety car was already out.
“It’s just silly, because, you know, 10 seconds for that…”
Bearman: “Try not to be fighting”
The penalty dropped the Haas driver from eight to last in the Sprint. “Eighth or ninth or 20th, I don’t really care. It’s a shame. I was eighth, so I was going to give everything to go for that.” Yet Oliver and Haas had benefitted from the chaos at the start of the Sprint, where Oscar Piastri caused a pile up with an over ambitious switch back overtaking move.
“We got very lucky to be in P8,” Barman admitted after starting the race sown in 16th. “But I was holding on for dear life with a set-up that was probably not the best for high fuel or sustained running. And I was pushed off. But anyway, tomorrow I’ll try not to be fighting with anyone,” he said in rather petulant fashion.
Haas F1 are not having a particularly good season, they sit above only Alpine who have been a mess all year. Yet the team brought an upgrade to Austin which was successfully trialled by Ocon in FP1 and is not fitted to both cars.
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Haas F1 upgrade works with Oli P8
“Generally, I think the upgrade is pushing us in the right direction,” revealed Bearman. “I would say it makes the car a little bit more sensitive and a bit more on the limit, that’s for sure, because I did a mistake in Q2 in my second run. Just a bit of wind is enough to flick the rear around.
“That’s kind of the compromise we’re playing with at this stage of the regs. Bringing performance to the car, you make the car more sensitive to everything. But it’s definitely faster, so that’s all we need,” said the Brit who needs to keep his nose clean for the Grand Prix and across the weekend in Mexico.
Berman went on to qualify P8 on Saturday afternoon for the 2025 US Grand Prix. He out qualified his team mate in Q1 by 9/10ths of a second which will see Esteban Ocon start in P17 after Lance Stroll was given a ten place grid drop for T-Boning the Frenchman.
How the wheels came off McLaren drivers’ title procession
Just five race weekends ago, Oscar Piastri was riding high and looked nailed on to claim the 2025 Formula One drivers’ championship. In fact after the Grand Prix in Zandvoort, The Australian driver was 104 points ahead of Max Verstappen and 34 points in front of his team mate Lando Norris.
Now with six Grand Prix remaining the picture looks very different. Verstappen has almost halved the gap to Piastri which stands at 55 points before the US Grand Prix, where the championship leader will start from a lowly sixth place. Further he is just 22 points behind Lando Norris who lines up alongside Verstappen on the front row of the grid in Austin, but Norris was 3/10ths behind the world champion after two runs in Q3, despite Verstappen failing to make the start/finish line in time to begin his second push lap in the session.
McLaren’s usual calm, collected leadership lost the plot yesterday when a turn one incident took out both of their cars at the start of the Sprint. Zak Brown reacted hastily calling it “amateur hour”, blaming Nico Hulkenberg for failing to utilise his years of experience….. READ MORE
A.J. Hunt is Senior Editor at TJ13, where Andrew oversees editorial standards and contributes to the site’s Formula 1 coverage. A career journalist with experience in both print and digital sports media, Andrew trained in investigative journalism and has written for a range of European sports outlets.
At TJ13, Andrew plays a central role in shaping the site’s output, working across breaking news, analysis, and long-form features. Andrew’s responsibilities include fact-checking, refining editorial structure, and ensuring consistency in reporting across a fast-moving news cycle.
Andrew’s work focuses particularly on the intersection of Formula 1 politics, regulation, and team strategy. Andrew closely follows developments involving the FIA, team leadership, and driver market dynamics, helping to provide context behind the sport’s biggest stories.
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