Oliver Bearman ended the Hungarian GP frustrated and described the round at the Hungaroring Circuit as his “worst weekend of the year.” The British Haas driver said he arrives at the Formula 1 break without the confidence he had built in recent races.
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Bearman finished the race in the last position among the drivers who completed the race, two laps behind the winner, Lando Norris. Before that, he had already faced difficulties in qualifying, being eliminated in Q1 and starting behind Fernando Alonso’s Aston Martin, a situation that, according to him, “hurt.”
During the race, the Briton also received a five-second penalty for ignoring blue flags while Isack Hadjar tried to overtake him to put him a lap down. Bearman explained that problems with the Hungaroring GPS system made it difficult to identify the warnings.
“Definitely, it was the worst [weekend] of the year. I feel bad about the blue flag penalty with Hadjar because, honestly, it was a nightmare out there,” he said. “Basically, you go through the inside part of the circuit, there’s no time to look in the mirrors, and practically every lap I did, blue flag warnings appeared on the screen.”
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The driver said the alerts did not work properly during the race and that he had no intention of hindering other competitors: “In this race, they were not working properly. So, it was hard to know if the blue flag was for you, for the car behind, for the one in front, or whatever. So, obviously, it was not out of malice.”
Analyzing the car’s performance, Bearman said he lost all the confidence gained in previous rounds and that he was back to square one. “It was a horrible weekend. From the first lap I did until now, I couldn’t find any confidence, and it’s like all the progress we made in the last two rounds was erased.”
The Briton also highlighted the difference between the performance in Spa and in Hungary. “I don’t understand how we go to Spa and have such a competitive feeling and so much confidence with the car, and then we get here and the car is an absolute nightmare to drive. So, we think we understand why, and that’s important, but we need to analyze everything properly before the next race.”
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