Ayao Komatsu relays on the positives of Oliver Bearman that he has seen in his rookie F1 season, and some differences to Esteban Ocon.
In only his first full season, Bearman has managed to beat Haas teammate Ocon by three points in the F1 drivers’ standings. Granted the Frenchman faced some issues towards the end of the year, but the Brit showed good pace and competitive edge throughout the year despite the rawness.
Bearman had troubles along the way as well, as team boss Komatsu noted, but he overcame those to still put up a good fight in races. He still remains ever close to a race ban due to superlicense points, but it hasn’t deterred him from delivering results, especially at the fag end of the season.
Komatsu noted some good performances, but he was mighty impressed by his run in Mexico, where he ended up fourth eventually after an outside of a podium. “Obviously, his talent was so clear from day one, so, yeah, it’s not, but if I say, if he exceeded some area, probably that Mexico, where all race, he had top drivers behind him, like he had Max in the first stint,” he said to media.
“He had, I think George and Kimi in the second stint, and then he had George and Piastri in the third stint, to just soak up that pressure, make no mistakes, to do that in the rookie season, I think it’s pretty amazing. I mean, when he was racing very well in the midfield, there’s no surprise to me, I knew he could do it.
“Even places like Singapore, where he’s never been before, he was able to put a competitive weekend together, even that one’s not exceeding my expectation, but that Mexico drive, where he had Max behind, you cannot get more tougher than that, in terms of pressure, but he just, it’s as if he had no pressure, of course he had pressure right, but the way he drove during that race, with such calmness and accuracy, was another step,” summed up Komatsu.
The Japanese highlighted his consistency that is a reward of an all-year work rather than few races. He notes about creating an environment where he can excel with the correct approach. He has that speed, but how to harness that in delivering a result is a big picture that has to be done.
“Yeah, that’s what we’ve been working on all year, like I said, from day one, speed is clear, but him having a heavy crash twice in Melbourne or overtaking cars under red flag in Monaco or crashing under red flag in Silverstone, those are sort of like, moments where you really should be doing better,” continued Komatsu. “But we’ve been totally, openly working with him and the great thing about him is back then, he was still 19, but he’s just got very open-mindedness and he’s absorbing very, very fast.
“So, I think especially, like from Singapore onwards, his consistency improved, but you can see, as a result, maybe it’s a step change, but it’s a long, long process of trying to get him to put a weekend together, just create an environment and then make sure, we have a correct approach, both from the team and driver side.
“We have to make sure he can do that build it up and then if you crash in, at the right moment, because his speed, like you say, is no doubt, so, it’s really about, how can we harness that talent in the right way and we’ve been doing that together and then he’s getting there, so, it’s brilliant to see,” summed up Komatsu, who highlighted the difference between Bearman and Ocon.
The Frenchman had a decent first year with Haas, but struggled in parts, especially in the latter stages when things didn’t work for him. The Japanese noted that Ocon is more sensitive than Bearman. The Frenchman needs things in a certain way, which is why he faced issues, but the Brit could drive in any way which helped – provided the youngster provided good feedback to improve still.
“I was a bit surprised to be honest, because Ollie is quick, he is incredibly quick, especially on the high-speed entry, the amount of speed he can carry is very, very good,” explained Komatsu. “And then, what’s impressive about Ollie is that he can drive many different characteristics of the car, he can drive around it.
“His problem before was more the other direction, like ‘come on, tell us where we need to improve the car’, because if he is not conscious about that…because he can drive any car, he can get the best out of most of the same stuff he knows, if he can go even quicker and help us develop the car, we needed him to be more critical if you like, whereas Esteban is opposite. He wants the car to be behaving in a certain way and he is always demanding that from Day 1.
“When he’s got the car when he is completely happy with he’s amazing. But when he hasn’t got the car underneath that he is not totally happy with, he cannot get much out of the car in that scenario than Ollie compared to Ollie, so that’s been a problem with him. It’s so small, it’s incredible, but obviously these guys are driving at such a high level and especially Esteban, he’s very sensitive, so if he’s not 100% confident on certain things he just cannot get there,” summed up Komatsu.
Haas has decided to prepone its launch date to January 19 instead of January 23 since Alpine and Ferrari will be launching on the same day to create logjam. Here: https://x.com/HaasF1Team/status/2008509165757493672?s=20
Here’s Haas rebranding itself
Here’s Esteban Ocon on leaving F1
Here’s Oliver Bearman on excessive bouncing
