MoneyGram Haas F1 Team drivers Ollie Bearman and Esteban Ocon qualified 10th and 18th respectively for the Japanese Grand Prix, Round 3 of the 2025 FIA Formula 1 World Championship.
Bearman’s top 10 effort – on his track debut in Formula 1, marked the American team’s first Q3 qualifying appearance of the season and the British rookie’s career best grid start.
Q1 saw both drivers run three new sets of the Pirelli P Zero Red soft tire. Bearman progressed through to Q2 with a final fastest run of 1:28.228 – advancing in P12. Ocon was progressively faster too in his VF-25 but the Frenchman’s third flying lap produced a 1:28.696 for P18 and an exit from knockout qualifying.
Bearman ran a used set of softs to start Q2, posting a 1:28.146, then stunned with a hot lap of 1:27.711 on fresh softs to take P8 – the 19-year-old earning a spot in the final stage of Saturday’s track action for the first time in his F1 career – his previous best qualifying position a P11 competing for Scuderia Ferrari as a stand-in for Carlos Sainz in Saudi Arabi last season.
Bearman wrapped the day with a fastest Q3 lap of 1:27.711 on his last set of brand-new softs – good for P10 on the timesheet.
Ollie Bearman: “I made a mistake on my last lap and lost a bit of time, so maybe we could’ve been a bit further up, but it’s really tight. Just to make it into Q2 was a relief and a surprise – a welcome one – so I’m happy with today. I’m not sure about the forecast for tomorrow and how it will impact things, but it’s going to be fun that’s for sure. This track and the fans are amazing, and getting into Q3 with this team is incredible.”
Esteban Ocon: “It didn’t really work on our side unfortunately – we tried a lot of things across the two cars and unfortunately something was missing for us. Here and there, we’re lacking pace much more than we should be, but it’s good to see that it’s working well for Ollie. We’ll put it together and learn for the future, and anything can happen with the weather, so we’ll give it our all.”
Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal: “All in all, it was a very positive day. Of course, your target is to get both cars into Q3, but before qualifying our target was to get both cars out of Q1. If you look at our performance from FP1, to FP2, to FP3, we’ve been improving our understanding of how to get the soft tires to work, but we weren’t there yet – so I wasn’t expecting that!
“It was a huge team effort, the team worked really hard, Ollie did a fantastic job, and that second run in Q2 was mega. In Q3, it wasn’t perfect but I’m not complaining, I think it’s good to see that if everything was put together in Q3, it could’ve been even better – which is a positive. Everything is fine margins, so it’s not big, and we need to look into the data as to why Esteban was where he was. Considering how we started this weekend, I’m very pleased with this team effort to get a car into Q3.”
