At first glance, it was not the result Haas had hoped for in the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix.
But dig a little deeper and F1 teams may feel much better about their chances this year than they did before the season.
Nico Hulkenberg finished outside the points after qualifying 10th in the first race of the season after sustaining front wing damage in the first turn of the year, requiring an early pit stop. Teammate Kevin Magnussen started the day in 15th place, but moved up a few places to finish in 12th, but was still out of the points.
However, the team leaves Bahrain believing that the race was a largely “positive” result for them and that they can truly compete with the teams around them on the grid.
“I’m not happy because I didn’t score any points, but it seems like I’ve got a car this year with a little bit better tires. It’s not necessarily faster than last year, but at least I’ve got a good car. It looks like we have it.” The tires are in good shape and I think we proved that today,” Magnussen said in the team summation after the race. “Nevertheless, it’s just one track, just a bit of tarmac and one set of conditions, so we need to show it elsewhere. We’ve had a good job over the last few weeks, The team is doing a really good job and we are in a good position – we need to find more.”
A big talking point for the team over the past two weeks, from pre-season testing to the Bahrain Grand Prix, has been efforts to resolve tire deterioration issues from pre-season. Last year, the VF-23 showed incredible single-lap pace, especially when Hulkenberg qualified on the front row alongside Max Verstappen for the Canadian Grand Prix, but as soon as the race started, they was sliding down the field.
The fact that Magnussen moved up a few places and Hulkenberg did the same after dropping back to 20th after an early pit stop suggests the team may have solved the mystery.
Photo by Joe Portlock – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images
Even Hulkenberg could see positive results despite a difficult start.
“It was very frustrating and disappointing and a very similar scenario to Turn 4 at the start last year. On the positive side, our race pace and tire degradation were in line with the other mid-range runners. It looked pretty reasonable in comparison and I think we’re competing against Williams, Sauber and RB, so I think we’ll take that as a positive,” said the Haas driver. “After today there will be many more discoveries to be made and things to improve and optimize. Jeddah is obviously a very different circuit with completely different characteristics so we will see what we can do there, but I feel like I have a better foundation going into it compared to last year.”
Team principal Ayao Komatsu also took positives from Saturday night’s race in her first race for Haas.
He then declared the team’s position after completing one race.
“It wasn’t a perfect race. Nico had a bad start and damaged his front wing and essentially his race was over at that point. Kevin’s race showed that we can compete this year.
“We don’t have the best degradation, but at least in the midfield we can fight for points.”
Looking ahead, Komatsu expects the team to achieve a good result at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, which is just a week away.
“We didn’t have a perfect strategy, but it was still a big plus for Kevin to be in midfield until the last moment. We need to strengthen it,” Komatsu added. “There’s a lot to take away from this weekend and I’m looking forward to another opportunity next weekend. I’m really looking forward to putting on another strong show in Jeddah.”
