For the usual leading trio, there was very little to complain about, with Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes having completed an impressive number of laps.

Ferrari in particular will have been relieved to have gotten through the first day of pre-season testing without an issue with their power unit, given how hard they’ve worked on it during the winter break.

At least the factory Ferrari side didn’t experience any issues, with the same not being said for Ferrari customer team Haas.

READ: Bahrain testing: Key talking points as Sergio Perez sits out, Aston Martin look strong

It was reported by Haas team principal Guenther Steiner that the team had to take apart a large portion off the rear of the VF-23, to fix a minor issue with the power unit.

“You have to take everything off to get to it and then fix that,” Steiner explained.

“We didn’t lose a lot of time, but I mean, if you have nine and a half hours a day, to lose an hour or two, that’s a lot of time percentage wise.”

Despite the issue, the American side still completed a good haul of laps, with Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg having completed 108 laps between them.

“We didn’t lose a lot to be honest. One run with tyres,” said Steiner.

“We still need to find out where the car is and get the best out of it, but otherwise, pretty happy.”

Following on from Steiner’s comments, it was confirmed by Haas’ director of engineering Ayao Komatsu that the team’s full-planned programme wasn’t completed on Thursday, but that it was still a “pretty good” start to pre-season testing.

“The objective of the first day of pre-season testing was to understand the fundamentals of the car – ride-height, stiffness, balance in the right window and mileage and reliability – so we tried to do as many laps as possible,” Komatsu said.

READ: Drive to Survive: Will Max Verstappen boycott the show after watching Season 5?

“We didn’t 100 percent meet our objectives, but Nico did 51 laps in the morning and Kevin did 57 laps in the afternoon, which is pretty good.

“We only had minor issues, but we understand the solution.

“It’s too early to talk about performance but our initial feeling is good from what we achieved – so it’s a good start for day one.”

The post Haas suffer disruption due to Ferrari power unit issue appeared first on Formula1News.co.uk.

Schumacher entered Formula 1 with the American team last season alongside fellow rookie, Nikita Mazepin, and he out-qualified the Russian 20 times in 2022 races.

The 23-year-old achieved the team’s best result of 13^th at the Hungarian Grand Prix, but neither driver scored points in an underperforming car.

Haas had been spending two years focusing on the new technical regulations set to be introduced this season, and they have had a car, particularly in the early going of the year, that has been capable of top 10 finishes.

READ: F1 boss explains why Mick Schumacher is under more pressure than Max Verstappen

Mazepin was replaced by the returning Kevin Magnussen at the start of the season having been dropped amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the Dane has scored points five times this year.

Three of those point-scoring races took place in the opening four rounds of the season, but it took Schumacher until the 10^th round to score his first championship points at the British Grand Prix.

The German’s performance began improving the round before in Canada, but he was denied by a reliability failure.

After his eighth-placed finish in Silverstone though, more points would follow in Austria.

During that weekend, he finished ninth in the sprint race after being passed by Sir Lewis Hamilton, who was recovering through the field after crashing in qualifying.

The 2020 Formula 2 champion had been holding off the Mercedes for several laps, but he was stuck behind Magnussen, and was denied by the team when he asked to be allowed through.

If looks could kill, those in the media pen after the session would have been fleeing, and Komatsu has revealed that it all made for an interesting debrief as their young driver vented his frustration.

“Mick was behind Kevin and that frustrated him,” he told Motorsport-Total.com.

“His focus in the sprint race wasn’t the right one, we talked about that afterwards. We talked before the sprint race about how we would do it as a team, but what he did after that wasn’t great, and what he said after that wasn’t great either.”

Magnussen leads the qualifying battle 12-4 this season, while Schumacher has ended up ahead og his team-mate in 10 of the 16 races.

Generally, the Haas pair have been fairly evenly matched this campaign, but Komatsu suggests that, when Schumacher is out-performed by his team-mate, he lets it get to his head.

That is when the Japanese engineer has to use his experience and calmy remind his driver that everyone is pulling in the same direction. 

“Sometimes Mick focuses too much on his team-mate,” explained Komatsu.

“Then I say to him ‘look, Kevin really likes to help you and he tells you things he would never have told Romain [Grosjean] before’.

“Then Mick thinks and realises the most important thing for the team is to get up in the Constructors’ Championship.

“I explain it to him: ‘Mick, come on, you’re doing well, focus on your own performance and not on this thing’, and then it’s fine again.”

Haas might even have been able to get some points on the board with last year’s troublesome car had Magnussen been part of the set-up.

“It’s very good for Mick to have an established team-mate like Kevin, we didn’t know beforehand how good he is,” conceded Komatsu.

READ: Guenther Steiner says he won’t make a ‘big gamble’ as Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg linked with Haas

“Then Kevin came along and that gave us a reference, we think that with our 2021 car we would have been safe against Williams – we could have fought if we’d had Kevin back then. 

“Mick would have benefited from that in his development.”

Schumacher is currently out of contract at the end of the 2022 season, and team principal, Guenther Steiner, is weighing up a multitude of options as to whom might partner Magnussen next season.

The post Haas publicly criticise Mick Schumacher: ‘What he said after that wasn’t great’ appeared first on Formula1News.co.uk.

After being dropped by Haas at the end of the 2020 season, the Dane probably assumed that his F1 career was over and it was easy to understand why.

The Americans replaced Magnussen and Romain Grosjean with Mick Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin for 2021, in what was the team’s worst season since joining the championship.

Haas opted to put zero development into their 2021 car and basically used their 2020 design for a second season, with the team putting all their focus into the 2022 regulations.

READ: Alfa Romeo CEO insists they will only ever use Ferrari engines in Formula 1

The VF-21 was absolutely woeful; however, Schumacher maximised the car that was at his disposal.

Mazepin, on the other hand, was dreadful and quite often in the way of much faster drivers.

The 23-year-old was dropped by Haas right before the start of the 2022 season, for obvious reasons.

This resulted in a late call to Magnussen, who happily returned to a full-time seat at the team which dropped him and his team-mate.

Since returning, Magnussen has claimed five points finishes, including, an unbelievable P5 in his first race back in the championship at the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix.

With six races remaining, the Dane sits P12 in the Drivers’ Championship on 22 points, staggeringly ahead of McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo and his Haas team-mate.

Whilst the 29-year-old has struggled recently, compared to his under-fire team-mate, the Danish driver is contracted to be on the grid next season, after signing a two-year deal when he re-joined the seventh placed team.

According to the team’s trackside engineering director, Ayao Komatsu believes Magnussen has returned to the sport as a different driver, with his “attitude and mental state” being “like night and day” to when he left at the end of 2020.

Komatsu loves working with the former McLaren driver, after admitting it’s a “real pleasure” working with him.

“Kevin’s attitude and mental state is like night and day different from two years ago,” Komatsu told Motorsport-total.com.

“He has come back much more mature after this year off. It’s a real pleasure to work with him.

“And he doesn’t even focus on beating his team-mate, he always thinks about the team.”

Whilst Magnussen is loved by the team and Guenther Steiner, Schumacher is currently facing very different treatment at the American team.

The 23-year-old is without a contract for 2023, with Steiner revealing recently that there’s only a “50/50 chance” that he’s retained.

Schumacher has massively improved as of late; however, his big crashes in Saudi Arabia and Monaco appear to still be very prominent in the team’s memory.

Steiner has also been particularly negative about the German driver at times this season when talking to the media, something which hasn’t gone down well with those close to the son of Michael Schumacher.

Komatsu actually demonstrated some support for the German during the interview, where he expressed the fact that Magnussen was very much the same as Schumacher “five years ago”.

“Five years ago, Kevin would have been exactly the same as Mick is today,” said Komatsu.

“Young drivers always want to beat their team-mate first. Kevin wants to beat Mick too, of course, but it’s not his first focus. He’s above that.

READ: Ex-F1 champion wants to race in NASCAR in 2023

“Mick just has less experience. That’s why this is not meant to be a criticism of him.

“He’s learning all the time. He’s not slow, but most of all he’s learning all the time. If he sets the right focus and stays mentally strong, he will go a good way.

“And he will learn from his team-mates. Because learning, he’s really great at that.”

The post Haas make claim about Kevin Magnussen ‘beating’ Mick Schumacher appeared first on Formula1News.co.uk.