How ‘hooligan’ Bearman became Ocon’s favourite F1 team-mate

When Esteban Ocon signed with Haas a year ago, he was looking for a healthier working environment than the one he had left behind at Alpine. Halfway through 2025, he believes the move has paid off – both in terms of results and the atmosphere inside the team.

Having previously endured turbulent relationships with team-mates such as Pierre Gasly at Alpine and Sergio Perez at Force India, Ocon says he is now genuinely enjoying working alongside Oliver Bearman. The Frenchman points to the pair’s shared enthusiasm for racing – and the absence of politics – as the foundation of their strong partnership.

“We have a little bit of the same passion,” Ocon told Autosport. “Except that he’s a hooligan! Because he’s young, so he’s experiencing… For example, at Goodwood, we had this challenge of who’s going to bring back the biggest slick tyre after the run.”

Bearman ultimately won that battle, producing viral social media clips at Goodwood as he turned the wet tyres on Haas’s VF-23 into slicks with a massive burnout.

“He just figured out some ways of overthinking the computer on the gearbox and everything. He got his rear wheels up to 7th gear while he was doing 30kph.

“I would not have had the balls to do something like that! Even if you’re doing 30, if your rear wheels are doing 280, the car can do some weird stuff. It was quite funny to see all that!”

Haas team boss Ayao Komatsu has praised both drivers for their collaboration, pointing to the example at Spa when Ocon voluntarily let Bearman through without a team order. Even their clash at Silverstone, which cost Haas potential points, was swiftly dealt with: the pair and Komatsu sat down together after the race, and the incident was barely mentioned in the media.

“I didn’t think about that, but it’s actually a good point,” Ocon said when asked if he was surprised that Silverstone didn’t escalate in the way similar flashpoints had with Gasly or Perez.

“That’s because we are very straight and honest between ourselves and straight away after the race, we sat down with Ayao there and we talked about different conditions, what we could have done better to avoid that scenario, where we should have taken care a bit more and what part of the corner.

“It hasn’t changed the fundamental thing. We just learned a little bit more what we can do in those kind of situations.

“It hasn’t changed the relationship we have with Ollie. [With him] I probably have the best relationship out of all the team-mates I had.

“We really get along super well and it’s nice to have such atmosphere inside the team and the track. With the team boss as well – because sometimes the team boss can be quite disconnected to what’s happening inside the engineering room. We are all united, which is good.”