Haas’ Oliver Bearman has highlighted he views Max Verstappen as the benchmark in Formula 1 after successfully holding his “nerve” against the Dutchman in battle.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Bearman battled Verstappen at the Mexico City Grand Prix and managed to overtake the four-time world champion at Turn 6 in the opening stages, while the Red Bull driver fought Lewis Hamilton.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, Verstappen later found his way back past Bearman in the closing stages of the race, putting him onto the foot of the podium at the Briton’s expense.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite being in a midfield package, Bearman held his own against the 28-year-old, resulting in a boost which has given him confidence.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In Bearman’s eyes, Verstappen is the best driver in F1 and is the “reference” for what speed and talent is required to become a world champion.<\/p>\n
Asked if battling Verstappen is the standout moment of his rookie season, Bearman told media including RacingNews365: “I hope not, because we have [three] more races, so it’s not over yet. But no, that was very cool.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Of course, everyone knows that well, in my opinion, Max is the most talented driver. For me, at least, he’s the reference of when I’m in a top car, and Max is also in a top car, he’s the guy, he’s the one, he’s the fastest, he’s the best.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“And that’s, for me, the guy that I’m looking up to, in terms of the reference of what I need to do in F1 if I want to win a championship one day.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“So to go side by side with someone like him is very cool. Of course, it was very specific circumstances, and it’s not normal to do that, but it’s nice anyway. It’s a good feeling.”<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\tBearman’s brillance against top drivers<\/p>\n
Bearman’s performance at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez was his best to date in F1, given he finished in fourth \u2013 an equal best result for Haas \u2013 after starting in ninth.<\/p>\n
It was not only Verstappen that Bearman battled in Mexico, as he also underwent large periods of the race with George Russell within striking distance – however, Russell cound not find a way past Bearman.<\/p>\n
Discussing if it makes a difference now knowing he can hold his own against the likes of Verstappen, Piastri and Russell, Bearman explained: “Yeah, it’s a good feeling for myself. As a driver, of course, I’m not in the same car as those.<\/p>\n
“But in that situation, I could fight against those guys. That’s a good feeling as a driver, and validates maybe the confidence that I have in myself.<\/p>\n
“But I’m also aware that it’s not every weekend, it’s not that now we’ve finished fourth in Mexico, that I expect to be fighting with those guys every weekend.<\/p>\n
“It was, course, a fortunate position to be in, but also I held my nerve going up against those guys.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Haas’ Oliver Bearman has highlighted he views Max Verstappen as the benchmark in Formula 1 after successfully holding…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283855,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,827,830,828,831,829,826,813,823,825,806,805,824,803,804,822,85],"class_list":["post-283854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-daniel-ricciardo","tag-f1-calendar","tag-f1-live","tag-f1-results","tag-f1-standings","tag-ferrari","tag-formula-1","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-max-verstappen","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motorsport","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-racing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283854"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283854\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}