Kevin Magnussen has denied that he is "disheartened" by Haas' disappointing results this season, although he admits that the team's underperformance is "frustrating".
So far the US outfit has only put eleven points on the board in 2023, which puts it eighth in F1's Constructors' standings just ahead of Alfa Romeo and AlphaTauri.
Magnussen and teammate Nico Hulkenberg have both delivered a pair of top-ten finishes to their team in twelve races, the Danish driver scoring a point in Saudi Arabia and in Miami.
On occasion, both drivers have showcased in qualifying the potential of Haas' VF-23. But the car's chronic tyre degradation issues have too often conspired to undermine their efforts on race day.
Read also:
Nevertheless, Magnussen remains convinced that Haas can improve its form in the second part of the season given the amount of hard work that is being put in by the team's engineers.
"I think it's frustration," he said when asked if he felt disheartened. "It's of course building when you see other teams developing and making big gains and we haven't seemed to make that big step yet.
"But I still have all the faith in the team that we can turn it around eventually.
"It's not going to be immediate but I think we're doing the groundwork to be able to bring that step later on in the year.
"It's of course frustrating when you don't have it and we want to be up there scoring points and doing well and at the moment it's a bit hard.
"We have made some progress. Overall, our performances have dropped compared to our main competitors."
Magnussen reckons that the disparity between Haas' single-lap pace and race pace has been reduced recently. But its' rivals' performance has comparably improved.
"Qualifying versus race, I think that that has improved," he added. "Unfortunately, some of the cars that we used to be racing at the beginning of the year have just become much faster overall and that's why we don't see that gain so much.
"But yeah, as I said, we're working super hard. The whole team is really working hard and I think there's still reason to be optimistic for the remainder of the year."
Haas team boss Guenther Steiner recently alluded to the team's desire to keep its driver line-up intact for 2024. But Magnussen offered no additional insight on Haas' intentions.
"We'll see when it happens and how that pans out," he said.
"I think at the moment there's not any news to bring and eventually we'll come around to it. I don't really know what's going on.
"I feel like the team is pretty happy but you never know with these things and I'll take it one day at a time."
Keep up to date with all the F1 news via Facebook and Twitter
