29/08/2025
NEWS STORY
Round 15 of the 2025 FIA Formula 1 World Championship began with Friday practice at the Circuit Zandvoort as teams prepared for Sunday's 72-lap Dutch Grand Prix.
MoneyGram Haas F1 Team drivers Ollie Bearman and Esteban Ocon sampled the Pirelli P Zero Yellow medium and Red soft tire compounds in FP1 - the opening 60-minute practice session of the weekend. After baseline runs on the mediums, both VF-25s switched to soft rubber with Ocon clocking a best lap of 1:12.144 (P17), while Bearman recorded a fastest lap of 1:12.564 (P19). High-fuel running completed the session - both cars utilizing their earlier medium tire sets.
The threat of rain during FP2 ultimately failed to materialize but in a scrappy session marred by two red flag stops and a Virtual Safety Car period Bearman and Ocon wasted little time in securing valuable mileage. Quick stints on mediums then led to soft tires going back onto their respective VF-25s for qualifying simulations. Bearman's quickest lap of 1:11.113 placed the British rookie P11 on the timing screens, while Ocon's best tour, a 1:11.361, locked the Frenchman into P15 at the checkered.
MoneyGram Haas F1 Team ran a total of 108 laps on Friday across FP1 and FP2 - 55 by Bearman with 53 from Ocon.
Ollie Bearman: "This morning was a bit tough for us all coming back after a long break. It's not the easiest track to come back to, being old school and unforgiving. My goal was just to have a clean session, find out what the car was missing in terms of balance, and we made a change in downforce level for FP2. That seemed to look good and in the right direction because the confidence I had in the car was much higher in FP2. We went early onto the softs as we expected a lot of rain, and in the end, it didn't come, so I set my fastest lap pretty early relative to others, but I think we stand in a good place."
Esteban Ocon: "Today was a pretty decent day, especially with the step we made in FP2. For me, it was a very disrupted session, and we did our lap on quite used tires so it wasn't the perfect session, but I think in terms of car performance, we made a good improvement, and we should be happy with that. The rain was supposed to come today which it didn't, so that was a bit of a surprise, but I think it's a bit more consistent for the next days, so the focus is on the dry."
Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal: "It was quite a disrupted day with VSCs and red flags. We improved the car between FP1 and FP2, and both drivers were a lot more comfortable and had confidence - so that's a good place to start. I think we need to find a bit more, and on the operational side of things we need to tidy things up, do our homework, and focus on having a clean FP3 and qualifying tomorrow."
Check out our Friday gallery from Zandvoort here.