Haas driver Ollie Bearman’s 2025 F1 Qatar GP ended in disappointment after a pit stop error and subsequent unsafe-release penalty derailed his chances of scoring any points. Having run inside the top ten and on course for another valuable point or points in the midfield battle, the rookie found his evening unravel in a matter of seconds when a rear-left tyre failed to be attached properly during his stop.
Lap 33 pit stop incident at F1 Qatar GP
During his pit stop on Lap 33, Bearman received the green light to exit, even though the crew was still securing the rear-left wheel. As he pulled away, the car wavered abruptly, indicating that the tyre had not properly locked onto the hub.
Bearman described what happened at the F1 Qatar GP.
“Yeah, no, I got the green light, but the rear left was not fully attached yet, so you know, when I left it was not on.”
He managed only a very brief exit before stopping — an automatic halt that confirmed the failure and instantly ended his competitive running.
The stewards ruled the brief movement was an unsafe release, handing him a 10-second stop-go penalty that led to a retirement on Lap 41 after he served it.
“Yeah, I went about a metre and apparently that’s unsafe,” Bearman shared.
“I mean, I think it was pretty clear that the car was not going to go anywhere with three wheels, so… that’s what I said on the radio. I hardly left the box before I got a penalty, but the race was over anyway after the stop, so it doesn’t matter.”
The three-way midfield Constructors’ battle for sixth
Bearman started the race from 13th on the grid and was in position to earn points that would help the American team (73 points) in their Constructors’ Championship battle against Aston Martin (80 points) and Sauber (68 points).
Just 12 points cover all three, meaning a double-points finish in Abu Dhabi could swing the order dramatically.
He completed the first part of his mandatory pit stop under the safety car on Lap 7, which proved advantageous as he was en route to score critical points before the mishap.
He reflected on the lost opportunity:
“Yeah, it’s a shame because we were going for a good result. We certainly got lucky with the incident ahead at the early part of the race, but we did have the pace to be there and I was fighting in the top ten.
“So now we’ve lost some points against competitors and rivals, which is a shame, but we have one more to go and we’re going to do our very best to claw everything back.”
Despite a difficult car balance throughout the weekend, Bearman emphasised that the team had managed to extract competitive performance.
“There’s a lot of positives to take away from this weekend,” he shared.
“The car was very tough to drive, but we still found ourselves in a point-scoring position and without that mishap we would have been there, so that’s really positive.”
He also expressed relief that the incident did not injure any mechanics — a genuine risk when a wheel is not secured:
“I think it’s also great that everyone’s okay from the pit stop because quite easily people can break fingers, arms, anything in these instances.”
