The Ferrari-powered American outfit, which by the way now has a Russian title sponsor and a sneaky Russian-inspired paint job (by no means are these “American” shades of red, white and blue) – entered the sport in 2016 and has a total of 200 points 122 race starts.
With Romain Grosjean and Esteban Gutierrez behind the wheel, the team literally made a strong and immediate impression as Grosjean finished sixth at the 2016 Inaugural Australian Grand Prix, quickly earning the team 8 points. The French followed this performance with a P5 result in Bahrain and led the team to eighth place in the constructors’ championship ahead of Renault, Sauber and MRT.
The next year they were eighth again, but in 2018 they finished fifth, ahead of McLaren and Force India. It’s safe to say that it has been an uphill battle since then as the team haven’t scored a single championship point in the past 12 months. In 2020 they only secured 3 points, so they got significantly worse in terms of performance.
However, what would you say if I told you that this was all part of a plan? After 2020, the team decided not to develop their car for 2021 and to put all resources into the 2022 car, which complies with completely new aerodynamic regulations.
A Formula 1 team can be enormous in terms of development, especially since a number of rival teams have been “forced” to develop cars in 2021 during the course of this season. On paper, Haas did less for its 2021 car than any other team for their respective machines, including other backmarkers like Williams and Alfa Romeo.
This begs the question: how far could Haas go in 2022 if he immediately got a competitive advantage? If I had to guess, I’d say the best scenario is somewhere in the midfield – maybe they could also overtake Alfa Romeo, Williams, Aston Martin and AlphaTauri. Anything beyond that feels like a stretch, but you never know.
A more cynical view would cause them to bottom out again, but I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t really take the fight to Alfa Romeo and Williams, two teams that together only scored 36 points in the 2021 season.
