Oliver Bearman has outqualified Haas teammate Esteban Ocon at each of the last five races, as well as equalling the team\u2019s best-ever result by finishing fourth at last weekend\u2019s Mexican Grand Prix.<\/p>\n
Ocon\u2019s reaction at the previous round in the United States offered a hint over where his mind is heading as Bearman establishes the upper hand\u2026<\/p>\n
Oliver Bearman vs Esteban Ocon the next big F1 teammate rivalry?<\/p>\n
A version of this article originally appeared in PlanetF1.com\u2019s conclusions from the 2025 Mexican Grand Prix<\/a><\/p>\n How does a driver know when he has the edge over Esteban Ocon?<\/p>\n When Esteban starts dropping little hints, initially here and there, that dark forces are at work against him inside the team.<\/p>\n It happens everywhere he goes at some point and is partly why Alpine decided to release him ahead of the final race of last season after weeks of Ocon\u00a0dropping hints that his car was in some way inferior<\/a> to that of Pierre Gasly.<\/p>\n Oliver Bearman vs Esteban Ocon: Haas head-to-head scores for F1 2025<\/p>\n \ud83d\udc49\u00a0F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between team-mates<\/a><\/p>\n \ud83d\udc49\u00a0F1 2025: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates<\/a><\/p>\n So it was interesting to hear to his reaction over team radio after the chequered flag at the United States Grand Prix last month.<\/p>\n Informed by his race engineer that he only managed P15 in Austin on a day Oliver Bearman finished ninth in the same car, Ocon replied: \u201cWhat are you doing to me, guys, honestly?\u201d<\/p>\n His delivery \u2013 in what, it should be stressed, was a very short snippet of team radio \u2013 seemed relaxed enough.<\/p>\n But give it a few more weeks.<\/p>\n As sure as night follows day, if the current trend continues \u2013 Mexico last weekend marked the fifth weekend in succession that Bearman has outqualified Ocon, with the latter falling in Q3 three times \u2013 Esteban\u2019s mask will slip a little bit more with each passing race.<\/p>\n It is to Bearman\u2019s great credit that he has already poked and prodded Ocon, one of the more underrated drivers on the current grid, into that position.<\/p>\n His success in making his established and experienced teammate look positively average is not so different to what Gabriel Bortoleto, among the outstanding rookies of this season, has achieved against Nico Hulkenberg at Sauber.<\/p>\n Bearman won\u2019t be in the running for any of those Rookie of the Year awards.<\/p>\n His poor disciplinary record<\/a> \u2013 10 penalty points, two away from a race ban, up until Brazil \u2013 has put paid to that.<\/p>\n As has his terrible error of crashing in the pit lane under red flags at Silverstone, that single incident responsible for four of those points.<\/p>\n Yet his overall potential, it is increasingly clear, is as high as any of this year\u2019s debutants.<\/p>\n More on Oliver Bearman and Esteban Ocon from PlanetF1.com<\/p>\n \ud83d\udc49 Oliver Bearman news<\/a><\/p>\n \ud83d\udc49 Esteban Ocon news<\/a><\/p>\n Watch Bearman drive and you are transported back five years to the sight of an emerging George Russell in the Williams: always aggressive, always charging hard, not always tidy but very often effective.<\/p>\n