The team principal of Formula 1's smallest outfit has strongly refuted any likening of their 2025 rookie, Oliver Bearman, to former Haas driver Nikita Mazepin.
Since their unsuccessful pairing of Mazepin with another newcomer, Mick Schumacher, in 2021, Haas has opted only for experienced drivers.
This trend will change in 2025, with 19-year-old Ferrari protégé Bearman set to team up with the experienced yet controversial departing Alpine driver Esteban Ocon.
Ayao Komatsu, who succeeded former Haas chief Gunther Steiner from 2024, when questioned about his concerns over his first driver selection, stated: "You have to trust your drivers and make them feel comfortable. Then they'll perform.
"Esteban definitely has the talent and the right work ethic," the Japanese executive told Auto Motor und Sport. "He really wanted to be part of our project. He is still young and has something to prove. It is our job to create the right environment for both drivers and make sure they work well together. Maybe I am a bit naive, and maybe I will be proved wrong, but if I wasn't fully convinced that both will pull together for the team, I wouldn't have chosen them."
Bearman first caught the Formula 1 community's full attention when he scored points substituting for the unwell Carlos Sainz in a Ferrari at Jeddah earlier this season, though his current Formula 2 season has been less stellar.
"Everyone reacted like he won in Jeddah, but he wasn't even matching the pace of the other Ferrari," commented 1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve.
"Bearman still needs to make that next step - he has done enough to deserve that chance at Haas but now we will see how good of a driver he really is."
Addressing the comparisons between Bearman's upcoming debut and the previous rookie experiment with Mazepin, Komatsu firmly denied any parallels.
"Every situation is different," he noted. "You can't put a Nikita Mazepin and an Ollie Bearman in the same category. That's nonsense," the Haas team boss asserted.
"I see clear potential in Ollie."
He also minimized concerns over Bearman's less than impressive F2 campaign.
"I have no explanation for this because I don't know enough about Formula 2 and the strengths and weaknesses of the Prema team," Komatsu explained.
"For me, the data from his FP1 outings in our car are much more valuable. We have all the information we need from that."
