This week the Haas Formula 1 team confirmed what had long been mooted in the paddock: Esteban Ocon will be leaving at the end of the current 2026 season. But the man himself has designs on staying in F1.
“My focus is on Formula 1,” he said in Malaysia. “That is clear, that's where I belong, that's where I want to be. So I'm not going to look elsewhere.” Ocon has had two up-and-down seasons at Haas after moving from Alpine, where he spent five years before falling out of favour with the latest management regime, headed by Flavio Briatore. He won the 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix for Alpine from eighth on the grid.
At Haas he has struggled with a car riddled with inconsistencies, but team-mate Oliver Bearman has generally wrangled better results from the same machinery. As an independent team, Haas is among the least well-funded on the grid, so it has often fallen behind over the course of a season. Ocon also complained regularly about instability under braking which came and went unexpectedly.
“For the past 10 races we should have been performing like that,” he said after one race. “We clearly missed out on something. It leaves a bittersweet taste.” Missed opportunities have been a recurring theme throughout the 2026 season. Ocon has a directness which can be interpreted as undiplomatic, but it was precisely this quality for which he was hired. “I've just been doing my job trying to get the cars to where they should be,” Ocon said.
Source: Autosport F1 News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing