Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsHaas F1 Team

Haas sure drivers will 'complement each other'

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Gene Haas expects his driver line-up of Esteban Gutierrez and Romain Grosjean to "complement each other" this season.

Ahead of Haas' debut F1 season, the team has recruited Gutierrez from Ferrari and Grosjean from Lotus to ensure it has experience for its first year. With Haas having entered in to a close technical partnership with Ferrari, the team owner believes Gutierrez's role as reserve at Maranello last year will help him ensure Haas is making the most of the equipment available to it.

"Gutierrez has been a Ferrari test driver, so he’s up to speed with simulators and Ferrari equipment," Haas told Sports Business Daily Global. "He has driven some of the Ferrari cars, so he’s going to be a little bit further ahead.

"Grosjean as a current Formula 1 driver is going to be more familiar with the tracks, requirements and tyre strategies. We have none of that knowledge now. Most teams will develop a book as they go from race to race, year after year and you look at those notes. We don’t have a notebook, so we have to develop all of that.

"I think that’s where Romain will have an advantage, and then Gutierrez will have the advantage on the equipment side since he’s going to be more familiar with it. Those two guys together will be able to complement each other and give us a better package."

Haas will launch its first F1 car in the pit lane on the opening day of pre-season testing in Barcelona on February 22.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.