Category: Formula One

Haas F1 Team just missed a point-scoring result in the Italian Grand Prix Sunday at Autodromo Nazionale Monza with drivers Romain Grosjean and Esteban Gutiérrez finishing 11th and 13th, respectively.

Grosjean overcame a five-place grid penalty for a gearbox change that turned his 12th-place qualifying effort into a 17th-place starting spot. Despite the setback, Grosjean made the most of his start, rallying to 13th after the first lap. He then passed the Manor of Pascal Wehrlein on lap two to take 12th. From there, Grosjean settled in for a long haul, at least by Formula One standards. He was the last driver to pit, going 28 laps before swapping the Pirelli P Zero Yellow soft tires he used to start the race for a set of Red supersofts, a questionable tire choice considering the amount of racing that remained. Grosjean somehow managed those tires for the next 25 laps, with his one-stop strategy allowing him to finish 11th even while holding off the surging McLaren of Jenson Button in the closing laps.

Optimism was high that Gutiérrez would score his first points of the season as he began the race in 10th place thanks to a strong qualifying performance on Saturday. It was rendered moot, however, when wheel spin produced a terrible start and Esteban saw the field scream around him before the first chicane, dropping him all the way to 20th. Gutiérrez recovered a bit to climb to 18th by lap seven. By lap 24, he had climbed to 15th. He made his second and final stop at the end of lap 34, grabbing a used set of Red supersofts that helped him finish 13th.

Fourteen rounds into the 21-race Formula One schedule, Haas F1 Team remains eighth in the constructor standings with 28 points. There was no movement on either side of the American squad, as seventh-place Toro Rosso and ninth-place Renault failed to score points in the Italian Grand Prix. Toro Rosso’s margin over Haas F1 Team is 17 points and Renault is 22 points back.

Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg won the Italian Grand Prix by a stout 15.070 seconds over his teammate Lewis Hamilton, further tightening the championship battle.

Seven races remain on the 2016 Formula One schedule, with the next event coming in two weeks with the Singapore Grand Prix Sept. 18 at Marina Bay Street Circuit.

Romain Grosjean – Driver #8
“To be fair, I think we were just lacking a little bit of speed in the race to make the points. We tried a very aggressive one-stop strategy. I had a bit of graining on the softs in the first stint through those last few laps. That cost us a few seconds, but I don’t think I could have gotten the 12 seconds needed to get to P10 in the end. That was about the maximum today. We just need to learn what we can do better for the next race. I’m now looking ahead to Singapore. It’s one of the best races of the season.”

Esteban Gutiérrez – Driver #21
“It was a very disappointing start to the race losing a lot of positions. It was very tough to recover, but I did my best. I struggled in the first stint with the overall pace, starting with the scrubbed tires from qualifying and fighting with people which were on new tires. It wasn’t very easy, but we kept ourselves together and pushed really hard to recover everything we could, but what we lost in the beginning was too much to get back to where we started. Now we’ll look ahead to Singapore and we’ll be focusing on that to come back stronger.

Guenther Steiner – Team Principal
“Here we go again with an 11th- and a 13th-place finish. I think once we got going, it was a pretty good race. If you take off the first 20 seconds of it, we could have been in a different position with Esteban. He missed the start, and that put him back, but he recovered to finish 13th. Romain came from 17th to 11th with a good strategy and good driving and, overall, it was a good effort. Unfortunately, none of the big boys dropped out, so we ended up 11th again. We showed that we have some speed at this kind of track. Hopefully, we can bring that forward to some of the upcoming tracks we visit. Being ahead and fighting with McLaren is something we can be proud of. McLaren is a team that’s been around a long time, and we’re the newcomers. Fighting with them and racing with drivers of the caliber of Button and Alonso makes us proud. But, we still haven’t got any points from today.”

Image courtesy of Haas F1 Media

Eric Barnes @ebarnes442

When Haas F1 Team debuted in the 2016 FIA Formula One World Championship to become the first American Formula One team in 30 years, it did so with help from two Italian partners – Scuderia Ferrari and Dallara. It’s a collaboration that continues as Formula One comes into the final leg of its European stretch with the Italian Grand Prix Sunday at Autodromo Nazionale Monza.

Maranello-based Ferrari provides Haas F1 Team with its power unit, gearbox and overall technical support, and famed racecar builder Dallara has Haas F1 Team’s design staff embedded in its Parma headquarters.

Proof of the program’s success can be found in Haas F1 Team’s eighth-place standing in the constructor ranks, where after 13 races it is 22 points ahead of ninth-place Renault and only 17 points behind seventh-place Toro Rosso. The 28 points Haas F1 Team has earned so far this season are the most of any new team in this millennium. When Jaguar debuted in 2000 and when Toyota came on the scene in 2002, each entity managed only two point-paying finishes in their entire first seasons for a combined total of six points.

With Ferrari providing the horsepower and an upgrade package for Haas F1 Team, the outfit feels well-prepared for Formula One’s fastest track. The circuit’s long straights combined with teams’ low-drag configurations and new rear wing mean that speeds approach 360 kph (224 mph). Cornering speeds are relatively low and with the high-speed straights, tire wear is minimal.

After 2 optimistic practice sessions that saw Grosjean 6th quick and Gutiérrez 9th quick in FP1 and Grosjean 9th quick and Gutiérrez 14th quick in FP2 hopes were running high for both cars to make it into Q3 on Saturday.

A spin in FP3 for Grosjean forced a gearbox change for the #8 VF-16 which will result in a 5 grid-spot penalty for the Frenchman.

Qualifying Report:

Both Haas F1 drivers easily made it into Q2 as the new rear wing and engine updates appeared to be paying immediate dividends. Grosjean could only muster the 12th fastest lap in Q2 and was eliminated but Esteban Gutiérrez became the first Haas driver to make it to Q3 by turning the 7th quickest lap, splitting the 2 Red Bulls.

Gutiérrez acquitted himself well in Q3, even with the rear of his Haas VF-16 stepping out on him as he rounded the second Lesmo (turn four) during his qualifying lap. Gutiérrez ended the final round of knockout qualifying in 10th with a fast lap of 1:23.184 and Grosjean, after his 5 grid-spot penalty will start P17.

Lewis Hamilton claimed the pole with a blistering lap of 1:21.135, an average speed around 159MPH!

Pirelli is bringing three tire compounds to Monza:

P Zero White medium – less grip, less wear (used for long-race stints)

P Zero Yellow soft – more grip, medium wear (used for shorter-race stints and initial portion of qualifying)

P Zero Red supersoft – highest amount of grip, highest amount of wear (used for qualifying and select race situations)

Pirelli provides each driver 13 sets of dry tires for the race weekend. Of those 13 sets, drivers and their teams can choose the specifications of 10 of those sets from the three compounds Pirelli selected. The remaining three sets are defined by Pirelli – two mandatory tire specifications for the race (one set of P Zero White mediums and one set of P Zero Yellow softs) and one mandatory specification for Q3 (one set of P Zero Red supersofts).

Haas F1 Team’s drivers have selected the following amounts:

Grosjean: one set of P Zero White mediums, three sets of P Zero Yellow softs and nine sets of P Zero Red supersofts

Gutiérrez: two sets of P Zero White mediums, two sets of P Zero Yellow softs and nine sets of P Zero Red supersofts

Image courtesy of Haas F1 Media

EB 3-Sept

The Belgian Grand Prix Sunday at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps began well for Haas F1 Team, but a red-flag period scuttled the team’s strategy, leaving drivers Esteban Gutiérrez and Romain Grosjean 12th and 13th, respectively.

Grosjean got a great jump at the start avoiding the chaos of the first turn of the opening lap by diving low through La Source and jumping to fifth. He was passed by Force India’s Sergio Perez on lap four but quickly settled into sixth place. Gutiérrez also took advantage of the lap-one carnage, where four cars were eliminated outright, and advanced from 18th to ninth.

Kevin Magnussen brought the safety car on lap sixth with a MASSIVE shunt out of Eau Rouge allowing both drivers to duck into the pits and change tires, a strategy that was quickly negated a couple of laps later when the red flag was display to repair the tire barrier that was knocked out of place by Magnussen’s crash.

The red-flag stoppage allowed the drivers who didn’t pit a free pit stop, as they were able to change tires on pit lane. (When will this stupid rule change?) This was incredibly advantageous for them, as no track position was lost. The positions they gained by staying out prior to the red flag were kept and the positions Grosjean and Gutiérrez picked up on the racetrack were essentially lost.

Nonetheless, 34 laps remained once the red flag was lifted, which meant plenty of opportunity remained.

As an energy-recovery system issue affected Grosjean’s speed, Gutiérrez was able to leapfrog his teammate for 11th on lap 18.

At the race’s halfway mark, Gutiérrez was 11th and Grosjean was 12th. Gutiérrez pitted for a new set of Pirelli P Zero White medium tires on lap 22 and Grosjean followed on lap 23, also opting for White mediums.

With pit stops having cycled through by lap 26, Gutiérrez was 13th and Grosjean was 15th.

With seven laps remaining, Gutiérrez and Grosjean were running 12th and 13th, respectively, with a five-second margin between them. As the laps wound down, Grosjean was able to cut into Gutiérrez’s advantage, but time ran out and the checkered flag waved, leaving the duo 12th and 13th.

Thirteen rounds into the 21-race Formula One schedule, Haas F1 Team remains eighth in the constructor standings with 28 points.

Romain Grosjean – Driver #8
“Well, it was a very good start and a very good first lap. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any top speed in the beginning of the race. Something was not going quite right. It took a lot of time to solve that. My last stint wasn’t bad. I made up a lot of time on everyone, but the damage had already been done. We had a shot at a good finish today. On the positive side, I’m much happier with the car than I was recently, so that’s at least great. It’s just a shame we lost an opportunity for a good result.”

Esteban Gutiérrez – Driver #21
“It wasn’t the result we expected. We were fighting very hard to get into the top-10 and even though we didn’t manage to get there, I think we did well. The balance of the car felt good and we had reasonable pace. This is one of the things we need to keep up for the coming events because it’s what’s going to keep us consistent and help us get the most out of the car. I feel very grateful for the team. They did a great job and had some great pit stops. We lost some time on the safety car before the red flag, but sometimes it goes that way. We finished P12, so I’m not completely satisfied, but we will keep pushing.”

Guenther Steiner – Team Principal
“A very interesting and exciting race for the fans. For us, it was a bit up and down. We got away very well, but then with the red-flag scenario, we were pushed back and couldn’t get further to the front. In general, both drivers showed good speed. We had a small issue with Romain’s car with the energy recovery system, which the team fixed within a few laps and in the end we finished 12th and 13th. We would’ve liked to get in the points, but that didn’t work out. However, we showed we can do it if the circumstances are right. We still hope to get some more points this year and we look forward to Monza.”

Image courtesy of Haas F1 Media