Haas has firmed up Andrea De Zordo as its new F1 technical director to replace Simone Rest, with a new Performance Director role also created.
Along with the departure of Guenther Steiner as Haas F1 team principal, its technical director Resta also parted ways with the team at the end of 2023 season. The outfit chose for internal promotion for this as well, like Ayao Komatsu.
They promoted chief designer De Zordo to be the new technical director while also creating a position of Performance Director, with Damien Brayshaw in the charge. All these changes has had an impact considering the short period between firing and promotion.
They revealed their livery for 2024 F1 season on Friday and are scheduled for a shakedown on February 11 at Silverstone, which is one month time since the departure of key people. But Komatsu reckons that Haas has managed to handle it well so far with the changes.
“Our new Technical Director is Andrea De Zordo,” said Komatsu. “He was the Chief Designer previously and is a very technical person. His communication is good, he’s very engaged and he listens to people, so I’m very happy about that appointment. We are now recruiting for our Chief Designer, but I believe we have good internal candidates, so we’ll look to promote internally.
“Another key position is the Performance Director, this is a position that wasn’t there before, but we’ve created it putting Damien Brayshaw, previously the Head of Vehicle Performance Group, into the role. He will oversee and drive the direction for the upgrades together with the aero department and all the other functions that analyze the full-scale car, which is trackside engineering, the Vehicle Performance Group, Tire Group etc.
“They’re the key changes – we’re getting everyone on board, talking together, and be a part of steering the ship. It has impacted things, as it was announced on January 10, and we’re running our car for the first time on February 11 – that’s a pretty short timeframe. However, in terms of car build and preparation for the test, it wasn’t a problem operationally.
“It wasn’t just my role, we had a Technical Director leave as well, so there were two significant vacancies to fill. We formalized and communicated this structural change as soon as we could. The timing of this transition period was not ideal; however, I’ve been very impressed with the maturity of everyone’s reaction. Thanks to this, we were able to keep the disruption to the minimum.
“Now we’ve clarified the structure, we should be full steam ahead,” summed up Komatsu. When asked if what they are doing will help in bringing consistency throughout the year rather than have a situation of starting strong and dropping off, the Japanese agreed as they are trying to loop everything together to form a better system.
“This is why we’re making changes to the organizational structure on the technical side to ensure that whatever we’re finding out on the track translates into car development,” said Komatsu. “If you look at the organizational structure previously, there isn’t a clear path to close the loop on that side. Everything that’s found trackside, there’s now a closed loop going into the aero, wind tunnel and CFD departments.
“Now, at least even if there’s a disagreement, everyone is clear about why we’re developing the car in a certain way. That’s one key reason as to why we haven’t been able to put upgrades on the car and fall back in the season. We’re now already working in that way and there’s much better transparency, openness, and communication. Therefore, I believe we have a much better chance of upgrading the car properly this year.”
Here’s Haas’ 2024 F1 livery
Here’s Haas announcing Oliver Bearman, Pietro Fittipaldi as reserve
Here’s Ayao Komatsu on being realistic about 2024
Here’s Kevin Magnussen raised early alarm bells knowing 2019 scene
Here’s Guenther Steiner on his Haas exit
Here’s link to a F1 Discord channel, join in to interact
