Nikita Mazepin’s dismissal means that Haas could move reserve driver Pietro Fittipaldi up to an Formula 1 seat tomorrow. Or they could do something much more exciting.
Nikita Mazepin’s time with Haas F1 is now at an end.
The team already took Mazepin family sponsor Uralkali off the car in testing, a decision they made a week before the United Kingdom banned Russian drivers from competition. Team owner Gene Haas has assured team principal Guenther Steiner that the program can continue fine without Uralkali funding.
Now that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has ended that team-sponsor relationship, Steiner gets to answer one of the most interesting questions in all of racing: What does an F1 team do with an open seat just two weeks before the season opener?
For now, the expected answer is that Haas will promote reserve driver Pietro Fittipaldi. The grandson of two-time world champion Emerson Fittipaldi has already raced twice for the team, relieving the injured Romain Grosjean at the end of the 2020 season. He finished a best of 17th, but back in 2020 Haas was not particularly competitive with any driver, and those results can’t be considered representative of Fittipaldi’s career. That career is in fact the bigger concern.
Pietro Fittipaldi
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Fittipaldi won the 2017 Formula Renualt 3.5 series, but the only other intriguing highlight on his decade-long resume is a local-track stock-car racing title in North Carolina before he pursued open-wheel racing. Fittipaldi has struggled in appearances in Formula 3 Europe, IndyCar, and the DTM at different times of his career. He has no major highlights in these notably competitive series. His promotion to F1 would be one of convenience.
The best bet for Haas is probably to promote Fittipaldi in the short term, while seeking out a stronger long-term solution. The team will have options, but most will require some politicking.
For most American racing fans, the headliner would be Colton Herta. The IndyCar ace is 21, from California, and so exceptional in a race car that his onboard videos are notably more exciting than anyone else’s in the field. He is not technically eligible for a FIA Superlicense on existing points, but he explored entering Formula 1 last offseason as part of Michael Andretti’s attempts to acquire the Alfa Romeo team.
The licensing question was a non-issue at that point. The Andretti alliance, however, is a problem: Michael Andretti’s ambition is to build his own team, and he considers Herta a major part of that process. Andretti would only let Herta sign with Haas if the team agreed to bring Andretti’s project into the fold. With two weeks to go before the season opens, a change of ownership at Haas seems unlikely at best.
But while Herta (and McLaren’s F1-linked prospect, Pato O’Ward) seem unlikely to shake loose any time soon, Haas has other options in IndyCar. Josef Newgarden, an American and a two-time series champion, is one of the few drivers in the series immediately eligible for a Superlicense. While he is relatively old for an open-wheel rookie at 31, and has not openly expressed the F1 ambitions we’ve seen with Herta and O’Ward, he may be interested in leaving IndyCar to give the ride a shot.
Alex Palou, the reigning series champion, is just 24 and would be eligible if the Haas team were interested. Both have a much more successful career resume than either Fittipaldi or Mazepin.
But the most obvious answer in IndyCar is a rookie: Callum Ilott. The former Ferrari development driver was once in the same farm system as current Haas F1 driver Mick Schumacher, an arrangement that saw the two competing head-to-head for the 2020 Formula 2 championship. Schumacher won, but Illott’s runner-up finish gives him enough Superlicense points to be eligible immediately should Haas call. Given that he has a previous relationship with Ferrari (which placed Schumacher at Haas in the first place), Ilott may be the most obvious full-season solution after Fittipaldi.
Colton Herta could excite a U.S. fanbase if someone would give him a chance in Formula 1.
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Outside of IndyCar, the most promising name is 2021 Formula 2 champion Oscar Piastri. In what has become a worryingly common trend, Piastri’s title in F1’s feeder series did not lead to any real opportunities in the highest level of European open-wheel racing. He instead serves as a test and reserve driver for Alpine, the team that was developing him in previous levels of open wheel racing. That relationship is the biggest obstacle to Haas making a hire; unlike Ferrari, Haas has no past relationship with Alpine, and no reason to expect that the manufacturer would let their development driver go. Piastri is most likely to stay as a test driver while he waits for Fernando Alonso to retire.
All of these options are promising, and all should be pursued. While Ilott would make for the easiest hire, every driver listed here has a resume that indicates potential success in Formula 1.
So the question becomes, what does Haas want from its second car? If the team is content with Fittipaldi, all of this is meaningless. If Haas wants to move up the grid and succeed (instead of selling off the seat to the highest bidder), the team faces a much more interesting set of choices.
Formula 1’s season opens in Bahrain on March 20th. The clock is ticking.
From: Road & Track
Keyword: With Nikita Mazepin Gone, Haas F1 Has a Golden Opportunity to Make an Exciting Hire