Juan Pablo Montoya: Haas will benefit because of the Ferrari engine

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F1 icon Juan Pablo Montoya sat down with  VegasInsider, to discuss what to expect from the F1 teams this season, emphasizing on the Ferrari engine and how it could benefit Haas. Here’s what Montoya said:

  • Haas will benefit from the Ferrari connection

“If Ferrari built a good car that it looks like they have, and you’re Haas and you get the engine, the gearbox, the rear suspension and the front suspension and you do a half-decent job on the aero package, you might not be that far from a Ferrari.”

“If your basics are very good – if Ferrari made a huge step forward, they (Haas) made a huge step forward. Plus all the aero games.”

“They get a lot of things from Ferrari, so if Ferrari runs really strong, they are going to run stronger. If you look at when Haas came in, Ferrari was winning races.”

 

  • It will be interesting to see how much of a step Williams will be taking

“If Ferrari built a good car that it looks like they have, and you’re Haas and you get the engine, the gearbox, the rear suspension and the front suspension and you do a half-decent job on the aero package, you might not be that far from a Ferrari.”

“If your basics are very good – if Ferrari made a huge step forward, they (Haas) made a huge step forward. Plus all the aero games.”

“They get a lot of things from Ferrari, so if Ferrari runs really strong, they are going to run stronger. If you look at when Haas came in, Ferrari was winning races.”

Where do you put the AlphaTauri? Do you put it really close to the Red Bull, because they’re sister teams. They should be right there.”

“You look at everyone else, Aston Martin, where is Aston there? They’re so packed.”

  • Kevin Magnussen coming back at Haas surprised many, but it was the correct decision

“I think a lot of people were surprised, but I think he was the right person for the job.” 

“Because it would have been him or (Romain) Grosjean, in my opinion, because they are guys that have been in the team, know the team, know the engineers, know the working environment. And they understand the sport. When that happens, it’s easy to make that decision. You can either have somebody with crazy amounts of money or you look for somebody that’s gonna help the team.”

“At that point, you’re gonna look for somebody that is going to help the team, more than anything else, in my opinion. And I think they went for the safer route. That is the safest route they could go with. Because, who else are you going to hire?”

“(Pietro) Fittipaldi hasn’t raced in how many years? And he did a decent job when he replaced, a year and a half ago. But since that race, I don’t think he’s raced anything.”

“How many tests do they do in F1?”

“Are they gonna gamble it on a young guy? With no testing experience, no simulator time, a week before the race?”

“The choices were Grosjean but he signed with Andretti for a multi-year deal. He’s in a happy place and I don’t think he would go for it. So the other guy was Mags.”

“The other guy you could have looked for was (Nico) Hulkenberg.”

  • Bottas, at Alfa Romeo, is coming out with a vengeance this season

“At Alfa Romeo, I think Bottas is coming out with a vengeance. I think he really wants to do a good job. People behind Sauber want to make sure they run well.”

“And they are on a Ferrari engine as well.”

Thanks again to  VegasInsider. You can find the entire interview here.

 

Adam Sinclair
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