Komatsu Suspected a Major Breakdown on the Haas F1 Car Amid Severe Issue

Haas Team principal Ayao Komatsu acknowledged that he believed some components were damaged when his Formula 1 team completed their first practice session laps at the Australian Grand Prix. He does not anticipate a quick resolution for their issues with high-speed corners.

Following a similar running schedule in Bahrain as it had used for the 2024 season, Haas chose to forego performance tests in favor of exploring long-run speeds and tire management strategies. As a result, they lacked clear indicators of how their actual speed compared with the rest of the competition.

However, when the team reached Australia, they were at the bottom of the rankings, a fact that astonished the American contingent. The primary issue seemed to be their lack of speed through high-velocity turns, specifically Turns 9 and 10.

Komatsu stated that sacrificing a bit of performance in the slow-speed sections to allocate it towards the faster bends on the track was the sole method to bring the vehicle within a "decent" performance range.

I don't believe this is an isolated incident,"Komatsu stated. "We were greatly surprised since nothing like this was anticipated from our tests conducted in Bahrain.

The tests in Bahrain were not ideal, but we did not anticipate them being as poor as those in Melbourne. During FP1, when I took a quick lap, I believed that either some component had failed or our setup was way off target.

So once we confirmed everything was intact and undamaged, we realized we had a significant issue. The problem clearly lay in Turns 9 and 10 at high speeds. We then focused our efforts on improving these turns even though it meant sacrificing performance at lower speeds.

Ayao Komatsu, Haas F1 Team

Photo credit: Simon Galloway / Motorsport Images

However, at that point, low-speed corners were acceptable, though not exceptional — yet they represented a significant improvement over the problems we encountered in Turns 9 and 10. By the time of Q1, we managed to make Turn 9 reasonably good. However, Turn 10 was still far from satisfactory.

Ideally, we get this, yet considering our current challenges, addressing every aspect might not be feasible. Therefore, I believe taking appropriate actions over the weekend was indeed the right move.

Komatsu stated that the team intended to address the issue directly instead of abandoning it and concentrating on 2026. The team believes they have identified the source of the problem and plan to work their way through it persistently.

He thought that the team wouldn't manage to come up with a fix for several reasons due to how serious the issue was. Komatsu thinks this might have something to do with how the vehicle interacts with the surface when running at very low ride heights.

I believe this is the optimal approach considering the features of the Melbourne circuit, particularly our car’s identified weaknesses from Melbourne and the specific challenges posed by Turn 10. This way, at least, we have a clear grasp of the problem.

The following step involves identifying which component of the vehicle requires modification, or determining which part of the car can address this performance problem. Up until now, we have a fairly good understanding.

So then, naturally, the question arises: How do we identify a solution? A few might offer relatively quick fixes, whereas others would require an ongoing effort involving both computational fluid dynamics simulations and wind tunnel testing.

You won't be getting solutions for certain races; this situation is quite serious.