Ferrari team boss Frederic Vasseur recently dismissed talks about junior driver Oliver Bearman being a potential Lewis Hamilton replacement at Ferrari.
Before the 2024 F1 season, Hamilton shocked the F1 space by announcing that he would be joining the Italian giants in 2025. In the 2024 F1 Saudi Arabian GP, however, Bearman also raised a lot of eyebrows by driving brilliantly on his F1 debut. After his performance, the junior driver was discussed as a possible replacement for Hamilton when the seven-time world champion retires.
Speaking to the media after the 2024 F1 Saudi Arabian GP, Frederic Vasseur shut down any speculations over Oliver Bearman replacing Lewis Hamilton in the future, particularly because the seven-time world champion did not even join the Maranello-based outfit. Vasseur praised Ferrari's junior for his brilliant performance but emphasized that his role and focus should be the F2 Championship.
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“Don’t start to speak about after Lewis Hamilton, Lewis is still not in the team! But it’s a good signal for Ollie for sure, that was an important milestone. In Melbourne, he will be back on the F2 project, and the most important challenge for Ollie will be this one,” Vasseur said (via PlanetF1).
Vasseur added that the youngster would be given opportunities to participate in several practice sessions with the Haas F1 team.
“He will start soon the FP1 sessions with Haas, and this will be important also for us to give him experience and mileage in the car. But for sure, with this one [Jeddah] he has the result in the pocket already,” he added.
Oliver Bearman has been under the Ferrari umbrella since 2021. He currently races for Prema Racing in the F2 Championship alongside Mercedes junior Kimi Antonelli. In recent reports, Antonelli was named as one of the candidates to replace Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes after 2024.
F1 pundit reckons Lewis Hamilton is already focused on Ferrari
Former F1 driver turned pundit David Coulthard has opined that Lewis Hamilton's slow start to the 2024 F1 season could be because he is mentally with Ferrari. Coulthard also said that Mercedes's other driver George Russell has been clocking in better lap times than Hamilton, indicating that the latter might already be focusing on his future with the Maranello-based team.
“He’s just not been settled with this car. And you can tell, you know, George is just honing the lap time right now and you can feel that Lewis is on the backfoot. What we do know though, if he does find a window of performance, then you know he will deliver. But right now, it’s looking like his decision to head off to Ferrari, mentally, he is already there,” Coulthard said (via Sportskeeda).
Hamilton finished behind George Russell in both Bahrain and Saudi Arabian GPs, finishing P7 and P9, respectively.
