Ferrari impressed this past week during the first stanza of Formula 1 testing at Circuit de Catalunya in Spain, and it appears that Haas, their main client team, is also reaping the benefits of a big step forward by the legendary Italian team.
Haas team principal Guenther Steiner, whose cars are powered by Ferrari engines, said in the aftermath of testing in Barcelona, “The engine and gearbox here, we had almost a flawless test with the same engine – we never changed engines.”
“We had twice an electronics problem but it was a software problem, nothing big mechanical. They have done a fantastic job in my opinion.”
“To come out here with a new engine, a complete new engine, and be this reliable, it is amazing. If you look at the other ones around, and they are no dummies, they have quite a few issues.”
“So from last year to this year [Ferrari] stepped up a lot and it is very good, but how good it is is difficult to say yet.”
“We are pretty happy. We still have some work to do to utilise it, but I think it is more like – we made a good step but have the others made an even a better step? We don’t know yet.
“The times are very confusing here. With the tyres it is pretty easy to see what they are doing, but the fuel loads are tricky to find out, or be certain about what is happening.
“In general, we are pretty confident we are in the mid pack. But are we at the top of the midpack or are we at the back?
“I don’t know yet. I just hope we are more to the middle of the mid-pack than last year,” added Stiener.