Nico Hulkenberg declared that Haas is “in the fight for the fifth fastest team” after scoring back-to-back sixth-place results in the Formula 1 Austrian and British Grands Prix.
Hulkenberg led Haas to a double points finish at the Red Bull Ring in Austria, finishing sixth with team-mate Kevin Magnussen coming home in eighth.
The German backed that up with an equally strong showing at Silverstone, claiming sixth for the second straight weekend.
In the space of back-to-back Grands Prix, Hulkenberg has helped Haas add 20 points to its tally in the Constructors’ standings, bringing it to a total of 27 points, just four behind sixth-placed RB on 31 points.
And although fifth-placed Aston Martin has a tally of 68 points, Hulkenberg’s fighting spirit leads him to believe an improved Haas can climb the Formula 1 pecking order.
“[It was] obviously a nice rewarding feeling to get eight points again, to get P6 two times in a row,” Hulkenberg said.
“Unexpected, but I think deserved, we worked for it, we stayed clean, no mistakes, good strategy.
“I think the best of all though is the performance that we’ve had.
“The update really did something to the car, and I genuinely think we’re in the fight for the fifth fastest team now.
“Sometimes Aston [Martin], sometimes Alpine, sometimes some others maybe, but I think we’re there, we’ve been pretty consistent this season and I think we can hang on to that.”
Haas brought a significant upgrade package to its Formula 1 challenge at Silverstone and thrived thanks to its boosted performance.
Unlike Haas, its Formula 1 rivals Aston Martin and RB have struggled to extract performance from their respective upgrade packages introduced in recent times.
Asked why Haas has succeeded where others have endured setbacks, Hulkenberg, ever the team player, paid tribute to the changes made to the squads technical department in the off-season.
“They’ve just done a good job, and I think they’ve worked well, they’ve worked clean,” Hulkenberg said of the improvements.
“Every time when we put stuff on the car, it kind of works to expectations, and the correlation was also not bad.
“So, obviously, we’ve made some changes to our technical department and our aero department at the end of last year, and I think, you know, the result is this now, that it kind of works better and more efficiently.”
Asked specifically where the car has improved, Hulkenberg noted he’s seen benefits to “our high-speed and medium-speed performance.
“High-speed was kind of an issue all this year so far, to the tracks that we’ve been to, and this weekend it seemed that, you know, we kind of closed that gap to some extent, especially to the other midfield teams and also to the top teams to some extent.”
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