Formula 1

F1 proving harder than expected, admits Haas

Published May. 26, 2017 12:19 p.m. ET

Adam Cooper

Gene Haas admits that his entry into F1 has proved tougher than expected, and that his team still has a lot of learning to do.

His team has had a difficult start to the 2017 season relative to last year, when points seemed to come easily in the early races.

“I really didn’t know the depth of the technical challenges in Formula One,” said Haas. “And probably like most of the fans, they really don’t know how complex these cars are but it’s intriguing, it’s fun to get involved in it. We have great partners and I think we’re doing OK. We were a little bit lucky last year and now our luck has got more normal, it’s more normal luck that you typically have in racing so it’s a challenge.

“All these teams, they’re all very good at what they do. We’re weak in areas like tire strategy and we’re a little weak in our pit areas. We get caught behind cars that cost us positions. All these little things that all add up to a tenth of a second. That’s really where we lose a lot of time and I think that as we develop, we get better at that.”

Haas says that his F1 involvement has done what it was supposed to for his brand.

“As far as the relationship to my business, it’s given us an impact, a notoriety. It’s a premium product and we associate a premium machine tool with a premium product, so I think that’s good. It’s a long-term strategy. We are more here to learn than to race at the moment. I’m very happy where we are right now. I don’t really know what the future holds, but right now we're content.”

Everything you need to know for the Monaco GP:

Get more from Formula 1 Follow your favorites to get information about games, news and more

in this topic

Formula 1