Bearman dealt harsh grid penalty for Red Flag violation

Oliver Bearman’s Monaco weekend took a major hit on Friday evening, with the Haas rookie slapped with a 10-place grid penalty for overtaking under Red Flag conditions.

Flagged during the second practice session in Monaco, Bearman was put on watch for overtaking the Williams of Carlos Sainz under Red Flag conditions — brought out to clean up the aftermath of the championship leader’s shunt at Sainte Devote.

The Haas rookie was seen streaming past Sainz into La Rascasse corner, and with his race engineer feeding the message through too late and the #87 failing to notice the flashing red light boxes, it was straight to the Stewards’ room after the chequered flag.

Despite Bearman and a Haas representative presenting their case to the Stewards, data and onboard footage clearly showed the rookie at fault, prompting the FIA to issue a hefty 10-place grid drop for Sunday’s Grand Prix.

“The Stewards heard from the driver of Car 87 (Oliver Bearman), team representative and reviewed positioning/marshalling system data, video, timing, team radio and in-car video evidence and determined that Car 87 overtook Car 55 at Turn 17,” the FIA’s official documentation read.

“Well prior to the overtake, the session had been red flagged. The team informed the driver rather late, just before the overtake happened. 

“However, it is clear from the video footage that there was a light panel directly in front of the driver which showed the red flag; and the dashboard also indicated the red flag well before the overtake took place.

Onboard cameras highlight Oliver Bearman, Haas F1 Team, ignoring red flag conditions during FP2 at the Monaco Grand Prix. Image: Formula 1.

“The regulations require the drivers to immediately’ reduce speed and proceed slowly back to their respective pits (Article 2.5.4.1 b)). The same regulations caution drivers of the fact that in a red flag situation, ‘overtaking is forbidden’ and that drivers should ‘remember that race and service vehicles may be on the track…’.

“The driver claimed that he saw the red flags but decided not to slow down abruptly because he felt that slowing down abruptly would have been more dangerous and that what he did was a safer way of handling the situation.

“We disagreed with his decision to not take steps to slow down sufficiently to avoid overtaking another car and instead proceeding slowly back to the pits, as required.

“The whole purpose of requiring drivers to slow down immediately is for safety – they will not know what is in front of them or the reason for the red flag being shown. This is particularly so in a track like Monaco.

“In the circumstances, there is no mitigating factor for the fact that he overtook a car under red flag and we therefore imposed a penalty of a 10 grid place drop for the Race and 2 penalty points.”

The rookie is the second driver to be penalised by the Stewards this weekend, with Lance Stroll picking up a one-place grid penalty for causing the FP1 collision between himself and Charles Leclerc.

As Qualifying at the Monaco Grand Prix is so critical to the final outcome of the race, salvaging Bearman’s weekend will be a steep uphill battle for the Haas F1 Team, especially given the rookie has only made it out of Q1 and Q2 once so far in 2025.

With Qualifying no longer relevant to Bearman’s plans, attention shifts to the final hour of practice, kicking off at 20:30 AEST before the 00:00 AEST shootout.

Image: Formula 1

2025 Monaco Grand Prix Schedule (AEST):

Friday, May 23:

FP1: 21:30 – 22:30

Saturday, May 24:

FP2: 01:00 – 02:00

FP3: 20:30 – 21:30

Sunday, May 25:

Quali: 00:00 – 01:00

Race: 23:00

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