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Nico Hulkenberg believes that new Haas F1 team principal Ayao Komatsu will improve their technical department.
Speaking to media including Sportskeeda in a press conference at the preseason test in Bahrain, the German driver claimed that his new boss had made changes within the team's structure that will have a positive effect in 2024.
After Guenther Steiner was dismissed from the team in January, their technical director Komatsu was promoted to the top job. With the American team finishing last in the constructors’ championship, a lot of changes were made to their structure.
Asked about how it was working with the new Haas team principal, Nico Hulkenberg replied:
"Yeah obviously he’s a very known quantity from the team, he’s been there from Day 1, everyone knows him. He’s made some changes, restructured a a few things in the technical department. It will be interesting to see how it goes."
"I think and I am optimistic that we can improve on the technical side as well, with some changes that he will do. So yeah all to play for but down to us to do a better job than last year," he added.
Nico Hulkenberg: "We want to somewhat recover from last year and do better on the Sundays"
Despite a lot of flack drawn by Haas when it comes to developing their 2024 car, Nico Hulkenberg believes there have been many changes to the VF24.
The 35-year-old driver believes that many of the elements on the car were changed and hopes some of their issues from last year have been resolved. He claims their main goal for 2024 would be to salvage some lost performance from last year and recover to a better result.
Nico Hulkenberg said in the aforementioned press conference:
"Well its always good at the start of the season. No bad days yet. Obviously we want to somewhat recover from last year and do better on the Sundays."
"Like everyone we’ve changed quite a bit, cleaned up some things on the car hopefully. Obviously I haven’t been in the car yet. So yeah will do that this afternoon and obviously excited and interested in what I find," he added.
Nico Hulkenberg managed a run of a total of 82 laps in the afternoon session in the VF24. The German looked comfortable in the car but clocked the slowest lap of the day at 1 minute 35.906 seconds. He was three-tenths of a second slower than his teammate Kevin Magnussen, who racked up a total of 66 laps in the morning session.
