Only Haas was missing to complete the technical migration process towards the Red Bull concept. The VF-23 which will debut today in Austin is not a new single-seater, but it moves away (with all the constraints represented by the chassis) from the original Ferrari concept to move into the area of the single-seater which is dominating the world championship.
It is not usual to see a technical update of a certain magnitude in the final phase of the season, but the Haas engineers had been at a standstill for some time, and a change of direction was needed to try to find downforce.
Photo by: Giorgio Piola
Haas VF-23: the single-seater assembled in Austin is inspired by Red Bull
Gunther Steiner pushed hard to be able to bring the revised single-seater onto the track in the home race, organizing a singular logistical plan to be able to complete the updating of the cars in time.
“We rented a warehouse near the circuit – he explained – because we are not allowed to enter the pits before Tuesday. We waited for the cars to arrive from Qatar and the updates shipped from Europe, and on Sunday we were able to start the work.”
“Four mechanics completed everything in one day, I would say even earlier than expected, and on Tuesday we entered the circuit with the upgrades already mounted.”
Haas will only have an hour of free practice today to evaluate the effectiveness of the new configuration, but for Steiner there were no alternatives.
“If we had waited any longer, not much would have changed – he explained – in Mexico there is another atypical variable which is the altitude, in Sao Paulo there will still be a sprint weekend, and in Las Vegas we would not have had any data on the track” .
“So, in the end it’s good here in Austin, we know we only have an hour of testing before parc fermé, but at least we start working and getting the first feedback. Then we’ll have another four weekends to understand the car better, and it will be a useful work for the development of the aerodynamics of the 2024 car”.
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
Guenther Steiner, Team Principal, Haas F1 Team
For Haas, the work that will be carried out in the last five weekends of 2023 is already a first step towards next season.
“We are leaving behind what we did up to the last race – confirmed Steiner – and we are ready to take a new path. The objective is to avoid finding ourselves with a bad surprise next February, we have the opportunity to verify in the next races the quality of the solutions that we will bring to the track starting from this weekend.”
“We don’t have to hide, we don’t have much to lose given that in the last ten races we simply haven’t gone well.”
Photo by: Giorgio Piola
The Haas VF-23 features slide bellies and a new bottom
Steiner, like all of Haas, did not go too far based on the good results that emerged in the wind tunnel.
“We know how the project goes in the tunnel but not how it will go on the track – reiterated Steiner – the data is not always correlated, there are many parameters, such as the wind or the dirty air when you are in the slipstream, which cannot be reproduced ”.
The first objective will be to check the grip of the tires during the race, one of the chronic problems that has affected the US team’s season so far.
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