Haas rejects Steiner claim over 2024 car: 'It is not about bullshitting'

Haas Team Principal Ayao Komatsu has rejected claims from predecessor Guenther Steiner that the team deliberately played down its performance gains over the winter to 'look better.'

Steiner departed over the winter, and was replaced by engineering chief Komatsu, who has guided the team to seventh in the Constructors' after the first three races, including a double points haul in Australia.

The team has been able to fix the tyre wear problems that plagued its 2023 car with the new machine, with the VF-24 proving strong in races.

However, Steiner, who has now embarked on a media career, claimed that the team deliberately played down expectations in pre-season in order to make it seem like it was exceeding expectations when the encouraging car was delivered to the track.

This is an accusation Komatsu has strongly rejected.

"So if you just look at the wind-tunnel numbers, I knew how much we were finding, but I have got to assume that everybody else is finding at least the same," Komatsu told media including RacingNews365.

"I know how late we started [development on the 2024 car] because we stopped for two months for the Austin upgrade and we are the smallest team. - it is not like we have got more advanced methodology.

"So that is what my baseline is, and it is not about bullshitting or putting up a smokescreen or anything like that, that is my expectation.

"Knowing that number, I'm sorry, but it is not a big number, right, so there is no way I thought that it would be good enough for P7, no way.

"How can you expect Alpine to do what they did? You cannot bank on somebody messing it up, you've got to assume that they are doing a good job, and internally as well, I don't want to see my people with the car in Bahrain in 10th [in the standings], and then get depressed with heads down.

"I want to make sure that they know what they're doing, and they just didn't have enough time to put enough performance on the car - it is not your fault if we are P10 in Bahrain, that is the internal message.

"I needed to prepare my guys that in Bahrain, if we were last, they don't get depressed about it, and then they have the grounds to say: 'Okay, this is where we are, and where we're going to improve.'

"It is not a bullshit smokescreen, it was my expectation and then in pre-season testing, after the long runs, I thought we could maybe fight two or three other teams, and be somewhere around P7 [in the Constructors']."