F1 star snubbed for Ferrari upgrade as team-mate receives huge boost

As Esteban Ocon edges ever near to the exit door at Haas, the team has made a decision for the Italian Grand Prix which appears to back up rumours about the team's priorities.

After using the gap between the Dutch and Italian Grands Prix to audition some possible replacements for Esteban Ocon's seat, the team have confirmed that they're only getting one ADUO-upgraded Ferrari power unit at Monza, and that it's going on Ollie Bearman's car.

While it's not Haas' decision to only have one upgraded engine for the race – Ferrari are only obliged to give its customer teams one of its new power units when they bring upgrades for their works team – it's fairly common for teams to wait until they have two available to introduce them, keeping things fair and equal for their drivers.

That...is not what Haas have done. Team principal Ayao Komatsu has loosely waved away the decision to break from the team's earlier precedent of introducing both drivers' new engines together, noting that it would be 'a shame to have performance sitting in the garage' at such a power-critical track as Monza.

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Komatsu admits change in upgrade philosophy

“Last time around we didn't do that,” he admitted to the media. “We waited until we had enough engines to introduce to both drivers together. Obviously Monza, as you know, it's a very power-sensitive circuit. So it's a shame to have performance sitting in the garage, right?

“Of course, it makes it very challenging. So yes, it would have been better if two engines are available at least. But again, Ferrari is pushing like hell to get as much performance on the engine as possible.

"Of course, they want to introduce it at Monza, for the reasons I just said to you. So that means they’ve got minimum quantity, just to satisfy the regulation.”

Haas boss: Last two upgrades were for Ocon first

Komatsu did deny that the decision to hand Bearman the crucial upgrade over Ocon was entirely due to their respective status within the team – although he did concede that the Brit's better championship position is 'part of' the equation – insisting that it's also part of the natural pendulum swing of upgrade introductions.

“Of course, that's part of the consideration," he said of the standings gap. "But again, it's not an aerodynamic upgrade, but the last items we had, like the CI [Carbon Industrie] brakes test, Esteban was actually struggling more on brake locking, etcetera.

"So considering that the Montreal upgrade, we got it on Ollie first, we decided to give that brake upgrade to Esteban first.

“We had another upgrade on the power steering before shutdown in Budapest. Again, we decided to give that to Esteban, because again he was more vocal about it, and he was struggling more on the power steering feel. So the last two upgrades we gave to Esteban – this this time around it's a back to Ollie.”

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