Yahoo Autos What the hell is going on at Haas?
Big leadership changes can have a major impact, whether that be either a fresh start or rocking the boat. In the case of Haas, it feels a little more like Gene Haas might have just risked sinking the ship.
To give the team owner his dues, it’s his money that he’s been putting into the Formula 1 operation – a lot of it anyway – and he is the person who gets to decide who runs his team for him. But in firing Guenther Steiner and replacing him with Ayao Komatsu, it feels like the Panthers might not be the only North Carolina-based team with an owner that won’t have the full backing of the team or fans.
Steiner was, of course, a hugely popular figure from the moment Drive to Survive hit the screens, and even prior to that given his no-nonsense approach. But being popular externally – and on the whole, internally too – doesn’t guarantee success or job security.
Yet, despite slipping to a frustrating 10th place in the constructors’ championship last year and appearing to be lost when it came to car development – generally the domain of a technical team rather than a team principal – it didn’t feel like Steiner was nearing the end of the road.
In fact, he was still one of the brighter spots for Haas.
While the team struggled, Steiner – who had a very good relationship with Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur at the center of that key partnership – was still a superstar who could keep Haas as an attractive entity to sponsors and partners. Money is certainly what Gene Haas will have wanted coming in, allowing him to scale back his own investment while retaining the team name and global branding for Haas Automation.
In my last interview with Steiner, in Abu Dhabi just over a month ago, he was confident he and the team had time to try and find consistency, after a start to 2023 that had yielded eight points from three top 10 finishes in the first five rounds.
“There’s a lot of interest [from the U.S.],” Steiner told RACER. “First of all, it’s a lot of interest for Formula 1, and obviously there is for Haas because we are the American team – knowing that we need to do better.
“I think we’ve capitalized, we’ve got a lot of American sponsors, we have got MoneyGram, we have got Haas Automation, we have got Chipotle. They are American corporates. Obviously the pressure is there, they are very good people and they support us and they know that we are going through a spell where we are not where we want to be, but at the start of the season we were in a completely different position, and they believe that we can put ourselves back in this position.
“So nobody is panicking or anything, but the pressure is there.”
Well, he was certainly right about pressure. Although it’s a surprise that it has come from within.
Komatsu gives Haas a new name at the top of the organizational chart, but there’s little indication he’s been given the ingredients to succeed where Steiner couldn’t. Andy Hone/Motorsport Images
The fact that Komatsu has been promoted suggests a change in what Gene Haas wants from his team principal. Steiner was certainly not always a yes man – in many ways he viewed Haas as his team, even though it was someone else’s money – and perhaps that was a frustration that grew too big given the final outcome in 2023.
Whether he has impressed with visionary ideas or is viewed by the team owner as someone he can have more control over, it now feels like the Japanese engineer has been told to stop the ship from going down despite the only notable change being that it is currently one senior body lighter.
The past 18 months have really brought the Haas predicament to the fore, with Dorilton Capital investing so heavily in Williams, and AlphaTauri (whatever it becomes known as) taking on a totally new structure and receiving extra resources for facilities, too.
The Sauber-run team is going to evolve from Stake to Audi in 2026, and while Alpine might run Haas close for a lack of clear direction, having also ditched its team principal after asking for what Otmar Szafnauer viewed as an unrealistic timeline, but it has also attracted additional funding in the past year.
McLaren and Aston Martin have infiltrated the top three teams with major projects of their own – a new wind tunnel and whole factory respectively – yet Haas has not kept up with any of the above.
In that sense it’s no surprise that it ended up 10th last season, and if it is going to deliver a better car in 2024 it’s highly unlikely to be based on changes demanded by Komatsu now.
And while you could make an argument for replacing Steiner, you don’t need me to tell you this isn’t football. So while the Panthers can hope for better from a change of head coach or general manager, it takes far longer to have an impact within an F1 team.
To that end, neither will it be Komatsu’s fault if Haas remains adrift at the back.
Promoting a more technically-minded leader worked very well for McLaren a year ago, but that was a team that was already making multiple other changes and investments, and Andrea Stella’s history of working with world champions during a long stint at Ferrari commanded instant respect.
Haas isn’t underfunded in terms of the day-to-day by any stretch, but Komatsu is facing the same issue as Steiner in the lack of extra resource and commitment to keep up with the rest of the grid.
In fact, if sponsors are unhappy with the change then it could become harder to maintain commercial interest without an uptick in results, and then Haas could be faced with putting more money into the team anyway.
Until someone’s had a chance at doing the job, it would be grossly unfair to state Komatsu can’t improve matters, but he’s taken on a position that, at this stage, has not been given any more of what it really needs to be successful.
He starts a tough job already on the back foot, but even in the face of filling such a big character’s shoes, his biggest challenge is going to be convincing the man in charge that his own promotion isn’t simply papering over some very large cracks compared to the rest of the grid.
