Haas makes “major” changes to team staff ahead of new F1 season
The American team announces a major change in the organization of the racing team's personnel ahead of the 2025 F1 season, when it will also be fielding new drivers: Esteban Ocon and Oliver Bearman.
Haas has made changes within its race team staff in Formula 1 ahead of the 2025 season, with adjustments concerning race engineers, strategy, and sporting operations, while welcoming its two new drivers.
The team’s director, Ayao Komatsu, described these changes as a major transformation during a briefing with the F1 media ahead of the new season.
Changes within the team
Laura Müller has been promoted to race engineer for Esteban Ocon. She joined Haas as a simulator engineer, her first role in F1. Ronan O’Hare will be Oliver Bearman’s race engineer. He has experience at Williams, the Formula E team NIO (now Cupra Kiro), and positions at Racing Bulls and Mercedes.
On the strategy side, Haas has appointed its first Head of Race Strategy, Carine Cridelich, who will join the team on March 1st, following her current position at Racing Bulls.
Francesco Nenci, former engineer at Toyota, Sauber, and Marussia, joined Haas this month as chief race engineer. Mark Lowe has been appointed as Haas’ first sporting director, replacing Peter Crolla, former team manager.
Ayao Komatsu stated that the factory-based technical team led by Andrea De Zordo, Tom Coupland, and Jonathan Heal remains unchanged, but that the field team has been deeply overhauled.
A desire to do better
Ayao Komatsu explained that weaknesses in field operations had cost precious points in 2024, citing examples such as the season opener in Bahrain where Kevin Magnussen lost a place in the points due to a poor pit stop.
Haas had made progress, moving from 10th to 6th place in the constructors’ championship before being narrowly overtaken by Alpine. “We left too many points on the table,” said Ayao Komatsu. “When the car became more competitive, it highlighted those weaknesses. We really needed to up our game.”
Haas recently conducted a testing session with old cars (TPC) in Jerez, with Esteban Ocon, Ollie Bearman, and Toyota driver Ritomo Miyata. Ayao Komatsu emphasized the importance of these tests for training on-site personnel and simulating different scenarios.
When asked about the choice to promote internally rather than hire external race engineers to replace Gary Gannon (now with Aston Martin) and Mark Slade, Ayao Komatsu confirmed having evaluated both options. He chose to promote Laura Müller and Ronan O’Hare, believing they had a comparable or superior potential to external candidates in the long term.
Haas plans to submit a proposal to Gene Haas regarding changes to its Banbury base, which could include a move to a new site. A decision is expected by the end of January.
