Nico Hulkenberg said Haas have been surprised by the progress they have made this season, after finishing sixth in the last two races.
His points haul over the last two rounds has moved Haas past Alpine and within four points of sixth-placed RB in the constructors championship.
Hulkenberg’s result in Silverstone came courtesy of a major upgrade package on his car. He said the team’s progress has “been very positive.”
“Austria was very good, then we brought the update to Silverstone which added more performance and was a good step forward,” he said. “I think so far this season, obviously we’re at the halfway point after Silverstone, we’re definitely one of the positive surprises this season.”
He said the team have “recovered a lot of performance from last year,” when they finished at the bottom of the championship standings with 12 points, less than half of what they have today.
“It’s very enjoyable, obviously, racing for points,” said Hulkenberg. “I don’t know how many point-scorings we’ve had now, but also a few times very close to the top 10. Obviously our ambition and target is to try and keep that up for the rest of the season.”
Ayao Komatsu replaced Guenther Steiner as team principal during the off-season and made changes to the technical structure of the team. Hulkenberg said these have paid off more than they expected.
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“We surprised ourselves a little bit already in winter testing in Bahrain,” he said. “From the get-go we found ourselves in better shape than what we could expect.
I think it all goes down to some reshuffling of the technical structures we had within our team and the organisation. It’s just been good and very enjoyable and positive.”
He expects the team will be able to sustain its recent form at the Hungaroring this weekend. “We’ve been around the top 10 and competitive within the midfield and in the race for fifth-fastest on many occasions and I don’t see a reason why it should be very different here.”
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2024 Hungarian Grand Prix
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