Nico Hulkenberg feels it is incumbent upon Haas to deliver “better solutions” for the 2024 F1 season following a wretched year for the team.
Haas finished 10th and last in the constructors’ championship for the second time in three years as a reasonable start to the campaign tailed off into a miserable season.
On his return to F1 after a three-year full-time hiatus from the sport, Hulkenberg scored points in only one of the 22 races, taking advantage of the carnage that unfolded during the Australian Grand Prix to finish seventh.
Team-mate Kevin Magnussen managed three 10th-place finishes, with the duo combining for a total haul of 12 points, four adrift of Alfa Romeo.
The VF-23 proved to be a handful from the start, notably with severe tyre degradation once in traffic that saw the car drop back through the field.
An upgrade at the United States Grand Prix offered virtually no improvement, to such an extent that Hulkenberg opted to revert to the old spec of car for the final two races in Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi.
Lamenting his worst full season in F1, in terms of points scored, Hulkenberg remarked that the two versions of the car were “similar”, adding: “But in itself, that’s not good enough.
“An update is supposed to be better and fix some of your issues. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen, so we need to try and do better next year.
“We just need to pick ourselves up and do a better job. We need to work hard because we want to do better. I want us to do better ultimately, and I think everyone in the team wants to do better, so we just have to try and come up with better solutions.”
The car had one-lap pace as Hulkenberg reached Q3 on six occasions in the first 11 races, and was 11th on two other occasions.
Once a grand prix started, though, Haas’ issues quickly appeared, resulting in just the one points-scoring outing at Melbourne’s Albert Park.
“The signs were there early in the season, that we got away with things, because other people were struggling more,” reviewed Hulkenberg.
“Once they cleaned up and brought some real developments, that’s when we started to pay the penalty.
“The second half of the season was then really tough. I think there was only one opportunity to score a point or two for me, in Singapore, which we missed by the wrong strategy call.
“Apart from that we just never had the pace to do it (score points). Even when there were a lot of cars dropping out, we were just too far away from it.
“Of course, that’s not great, and that’s why we need to do better.”
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