Nico Hulkenberg believes the initial problems rival teams encountered throughout the early stages of the 2023 Formula 1 season flattered the performance of Haas’ VF-23 car.
Haas opened the season relatively promisingly with a total of 11 points from the first five rounds, including a seventh-place finish for Hulkenberg in the Australian GP.
But that would transpire to be the German’s only top-10 placing in a grand prix during his F1 comeback campaign, with Haas scoring just one point in the remaining 17 rounds.
Consequently, the American outfit slumped to the bottom of the Constructors’ Championship for the second time in three years, having climbed to eighth last season.
McLaren had started the year struggling to escape Q1 before a substantial mid-season upgrade package propelled it into regular podium contention. Meanwhile, AlphaTauri sustained a late development push that hauled it from the foot of the standings.
Reflecting on the 2023 season, Hulkenberg said: “Obviously, it was a process, and signs were there early in the season. But we got away with it early in the season because other people also were struggling more.
“And then once they cleaned up and then brought some real developments, that’s when we really started to pay the penalty.
“The last or the second half of the season has been really tough. I think there was only an 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. Even when there were a lot of cars dropping out, we were just too far away from it.
“So of course that’s not great. That’s why we need to do better.”
In a bid to cure its tyre degradation issue, Haas became the final side to converge to the downwash sidepod solution pioneered by Red Bull at the United States GP in October.
However, the revised car failed to inspire the immediate upturn Haas hoped and Hulkenberg elected to return to the old-spec car for the remaining two rounds of the year.
“I don’t think there’s a huge difference between them,” Hulkenberg rued. “Minor differences. Last weekend [Las Vegas], I felt actually the new package had an edge over the old package on a low downforce configuration.
“This weekend, obviously I didn’t do the Friday, but from Saturday, I felt quite okay. Kevin didn’t feel so happy. I mean, both are similar.
“But that’s in itself obviously is not good enough. An update is supposed to be better, and fix some of your issues, and unfortunately that didn’t happen. So, we need to try and do better there next year.”
Hulkenberg, who denied that the team’s ties with Ferrari were responsible for its slump, has urged Haas to ensure that it assembles a better car and upgrade route next season.
“We just need to pick up our feet, and do a better job, we need to work hard, because we want to do better,” he added.
“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.”
