RaceFans Round-up: Haas must aim to “take a big step like Aston Martin”

In short

Aston Martin beneficial properties stunned Magnussen

Haas completed eighth within the constructors’ championship final 12 months, one place behind Aston Martin. Nonetheless they’ve seen their rivals take a leap ahead this 12 months, whereas Haas stays within the thick of an more and more shut midfield battle.

“Yearly we speak about how shut it’s this 12 months and positively this 12 months it’s taken a giant step once more in direction of being extra shut,” mentioned Magnussen. “So I feel it’s not going to be the case that you simply get to the primary race with a automotive and also you see the place you’re and also you keep there the entire 12 months and each race you understand you’re combating for P8 or P9 or no matter.

“This 12 months you’ve bought to get all the things proper to get that the P8 or P7 or no matter is the ‘better of the remaining’. There’s one of many midfield groups that’s moved up near the highest and it’s a distinct grid this 12 months. I feel that was what stunned me a bit of bit.”

Magnussen mentioned Haas made the beneficial properties they anticipated throughout the low season however want to focus on extra to meet up with the likes of Aston Martin.

“We knew we had been going to take a step with the automotive this 12 months and we had been assured about that and it exhibits on the observe,” mentioned Magnussen. “We do have that efficiency that we had been hoping for. Different groups have simply accomplished a extremely good job, too. So we’re nonetheless in that blend of the midfield.

“After all, we’d like to be in direction of the highest, taking a giant step like Aston Martin. However that’s what we’ve bought to purpose to do sooner or later.”

Mercedes’ Imola replace a “first step”

Mercedes say the key improve package deal they are going to deliver to subsequent week’s Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix would be the “first step” in remodeling the W14 right into a aggressive package deal.

“It takes fairly a very long time to develop within the wind tunnel and you’ll’t simply do this stuff in a single day,” mentioned the group’s trackside operations director Andrew Shovlin. “The Imola package deal are the primary steps in that course. We hope to deliver different updates later within the 12 months.

“We do hope that it’s faster, we hope that it’s higher when it comes to qualifying and race tempo. The important thing factor although is that we aren’t simply trying to deliver a lap time replace, we need to head off in a distinct growth course. One which we predict offers us a greater likelihood in the long run of with the ability to problem for race wins and world championships.”

Ericsson was “fairly damaged” after dropping F1 drive

Marcus Ericsson mentioned he felt he by no means managed to get his F1 profession going, as he misplaced his drive after 5 seasons within the collection. He described the second he realized he had misplaced his place on the Components 1 grid on the finish of 2018. Along with his Sauber group mate Charles Leclerc heading to Ferrari, Kimi Raikkonen’s arrival in his place meant an finish to Ericsson’s time on the group:

“I knew the opposite seat that Charles had was going to be a Ferrari junior or a Ferrari driver in that,” he told David Land. “So Kimi bought signed in kind of ‘my’ seat after which I knew that is it, that’s over. However in a method I by no means actually bought my F1 profession to kind of get going. At the moment I used to be fairly damaged down in my confidence ranges and all the things. I had a troublesome time.”

Ericsson admitted “in some methods it was disappointing, in fact, however on the similar method, I additionally felt it’s an opportunity for me to do one thing else and actually discover some new motivation.”

He finally moved to IndyCar with Schmidt Peterson and now drives for Ganassi. “The identical day I bought the knowledge that I used to be going to get changed, I known as my supervisor and I advised him we have to have a look at America, we have to have a look at IndyCar, that’s the place I wish to go,” mentioned Ericsson.

Completely happy birthday!

Completely happy birthday to Hyoko and Jen Campbell!

• 35 years in the past at the moment Ayrton Senna put his McLaren on pole place at Monaco by an exceptional 1.427 seconds forward of group mate Alain Prost