After a challenging and pretty brutal outing at the Australian GP, Haas F1 arrived in Shanghai for the Chinese GP with work still to be done as Esteban Ocon and Ollie Bearman looked to get in the fight with other cars.
A rocky start to the season in Melbourne
The Australian GP was a weekend to forget for Haas.
Both Esteban Ocon and Ollie Bearman struggled to find pace, with the VF-25 struggling with balance issues and a lack of grip, particularly in the high-speed corners. They lost a massive chunk of time through the turn 9-10 sequence.
Bearman, who joined Haas as a rookie for the 2025 season, echoed these sentiments in the print media zone following qualifying for the F1 Chinese GP.
“We’ve identified problems, and now we’re trying to become aggressive again with the set-up,” he said.
The team left Australia without points, but their determination to improve was clear.
As Esteban Ocon put it, “the team’s reacted super well with how difficult Melbourne was.
“Everybody was obviously frustrated but everybody pushed in the same direction to try and fix the issue and nobody hid it behind it which was a good thing.”
Trying to turn a corner in Shanghai
This weekend at the F1 Chinese GP, Haas showed signs of improvement pre-race.
Despite neither driver making it into Q3 in qualifying, Ocon narrowly missed out on it by just three-hundredths of a second, and the Frenchman is optimistic about the changes made to the car.
“We changed three-quarters of the car from the Sprint race to now,” he revealed.
“It’s very positive and I think there’s more performance to come out of that car as well. We still struggle with a few balance issues and a few things.
“It was a massive step in terms of confidence for me and how I could attack the corners and the car was much more together so very very good.”
Bearman also highlighted the team’s growing understanding of the VF-25.
“We’ve understood the car a bit more compared to Melbourne,” he said.
“It definitely helps that the track here is smoother, but we’re making progress. Just to be in the mix a little bit more is positive.”
Tyre trouble and set-up tweaks
Ollie Bearman explained that Haas made set-up changes ahead of the Chinese GP to address tyre degradation issues from the Sprint, particularly for the front tyres which take a pounding at this circuit.
“We made some set-up changes biased towards race pace, really protecting those front tyres, which is the main issue we’re having here.”
Ocon also acknowledged the tyre struggles but remained hopeful for the race.
“Tomorrow is all going to be about the degradation that we’ll get in the race,” he said.
“We are not far off the points, so we are going to try our max to optimise what we have and see if we can get something decent.”
Feeling positive for the Chinese GP
While Haas is still far from challenging the front-runners for the F1 Chinese GP, the team has been progressing since Melbourne.
Esteban Ocon summed it up, “It’s a bit of a weight off the shoulders for everyone because there is some hope. Smiles are back, obviously.”
Ollie Bearman is also optimistic about the team’s trajectory. He had looked fast in Q1 and was ahead of his teammate before the final runs. However, he missed out on a final run after not making the line before the chequered flag.
“This iteration of the car, it seems like we’re getting more and more out of it,” he said.
“Soon enough, we’ll find out what it can really, really do, and then we can find a clear direction from that.”
Missing out on the final run
“Yeah, it was going well, just didn’t manage to get the final run in in time, which really hurts.
“It’s very tight to fit three runs in in such a short qualifying session. All of the gaps that everyone has to make on the outlaps means if you’re at the back of the queue, then you don’t make the lap.”
Speaking about tyre strategy, the hards are an unknown tyre ahead of the race, and Bearman claimed, “The graining was quite bad today on medium for everyone, very front-limited tyre and difficult.
“I think it can be better on the hards tomorrow, generally the hard is a more robust tyre, but we’ll only find out tomorrow.
“Even in a sprint weekend like this, there’s still a lot of time to get up to speed, so I just made sure to remember that in the back of my mind.”
The season ahead for Haas
As the 2025 season progresses, Haas will need to continue finding performance from the VF-25.
Ocon and Bearman are both showing flashes of potential, and as the 2021 Hungarian GP winner said, “It’s a long season, and I’m sure it’s going to get even closer.”
