Haas team principal Ayao Komatsu hails a ‘positive’ first day in Bahrain despite lap times from Esteban Ocon and Oliver Bearman
Despite a power failure at Bahrain International Circuit that caused a lengthy delay during the afternoon session, the first day of Formula 1 pre-season testing is in the books.
Over at Haas, it was a “positive” first day.
Haas is one of the teams, along with Sauber, breaking in an entirely new driver lineup for the 2025 F1 season. Nico Hülkenberg — who is off to Sauber for this year — is gone, as is Kevin Magnussen. This year Haas will pair veteran Esteban Ocon, with incoming rookie Oliver Bearman, who drove in place of Magnussen in two races for Haas last season in his duties as a reserve driver for the team.
Bearman was up first for Haas, driving in the morning session. He laid down 72 laps in the VF-25, posting a best lap time of 1:35.522. According to the team, Bearman put together a “series of baseline runs on Pirelli’s C3 tire and a final outing on the C2 compound.”
The rookie’s 72 laps were the second-most on the grid in the morning session, topped only by fellow rookie Andrea Kimi Antonelli at Mercedes (78) and Visa Cash App Racing Bulls driver Yuki Tsunoda (78).
Ocon took over for the afternoon session, which was interrupted by the lengthy red flag for the power outage. He completed 88 laps with a best time of 1:33.600, and the team reported that his lap total was the “highest individual driver lap-count on the day.”
The lap times saw Haas at the back of the grid, with Ocon’s time placing him 19th, and Bearman’s 20th. Still, it is important to remember lap times during pre-season testing are to be taken with a healthy grain of salt, as teams are running different programs, testing different setups, and using different fuel loads.
Both drivers reported that their run plans went as they hoped and that they could build on their first day of work in Bahrain.
“That’s day one in Bahrain completed and I’m very happy to be back with the team and back in the car. It’s my first time on track in Bahrain and it’s a new beast in Formula 1, so it’s very nice,” said Bearman in the team’s post-session media report. “We got through the entire run plan as we wanted to, and the results were as expected – as we’ve been learning about the car and its characteristics. I’m now looking forward to testing the limits over the next two days.”
“It was a very solid day, and on both mine and Ollie’s side there’s been a lot of learning that happened today as it’s the first time we’ve experienced the car in good condition,” said the veteran Ocon. “It’s been a good day as we completed the run program. We’ve focused on longer-run performance – that was clear – and it was very interesting. We’ve got a lot of data gathered, and I go again tomorrow morning.”
Team Principal Ayao Komatsu indicated that not only did Haas complete their “entire program,” but they “found a couple of answers” during both sessions.
“It was largely a good day, we completed our entire program, did what we needed to do and found a couple of answers we needed as well. Both drivers had a very good day getting in lots of laps,” reported Komatsu. “We’ve had a lot of change in race team personnel, but I felt communication and teamwork across the team was very good. So, a positive start to preseason testing from us.”
Both drivers will be back in action on Thursday in Bahrain, with Ocon handling the morning shift and Bearman taking over for the afternoon session.
