This forum contains threads to discuss teams themselves. Anything not technical about the cars, including restructuring, performances etc belongs here.
I hope so, but I am not 100% sure. It seems like they are basically following last year's plan; and on the last day they ran some lower-fuel running with Hulk but they were still 1s off of Sauber. So my guess is not really. I hope for their own good that they are refueling the car between every run because pretty much every lap has been between 1:34.5 and 1:36.0, independent of compound, other than a few 1:33s from Ocon. Because every run is the same and there was not a clear race sim where fuel is clearly burning off between runs it is hard to tell where they are. Could be anywhere from 3rd to 10th. Ocon in particular had two good looking long runs about 15 minutes apart. I think it was on the C3, which would be the soft if it was a race weekend.
If that was meant to be a mid-race fuel level, then the times are not far off of Ferrari(!) and track similar to Lawson in the Red Bull, even though I would doubt they are that close to the works team or Red Bull. But more promising than Sauber, VCARB, and the "long" runs that Sainz did in the Williams which were all in the 1:35.0-1:36.5 range. I think people who expect them to be obvious backmarkers are underestimating the discipline they have to avoid any performance running.
"You can't argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience"
- Mark Twain
Last year the "Official F1" analysis had them comfortably last, which was obviously not correct. Looking at the actual data I have no clue how the person (or most likely, algorithm) is determining the race pace. Looking at the times on the spreadsheet from f1debrief, looks like it should be pretty close between Haas, Williams, and Alpine for best of the rest, pending whatever Aston is doing. Plus Bearman said they made changes to the setup that weren't good so there is probably more time to be found.
If they basically repeated the same run plan as last year (looks like it externally), then they are closer to the front than they were 12 months ago.
"You can't argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience"
- Mark Twain
I think there is some confusion in the article between "made their own suspension" and "didn't use Ferrari's 2025 suspension." I doubt they made their own suspension for one year of a dying regulation cycle. Although I wonder if in the future they will leverage the Toyota connection to start doing so. Especially as Cadillac will also be taking Ferrari components from next year.
"You can't argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience"
- Mark Twain
No, Haas themselves already said last year that they were going to use Ferrari's 2024 front suspension, because they understand it, and Ferrari are bringing an entirely new concept that will be difficult to set up at first without data.
