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🇧🇭 F1 2022 R1: Aall Aabout Aa Comebaack

As comeback stories go, Haas driver Kevin Magnussen has one of the best, but while the Danish driver securing fifth place is an incredible achievement, it also means questions could eventually be asked about his teammate. 

The future? (c) Haas F1 Team on Twitter

Last season, after the race in Mexico, Haas looked like a truly beaten-down and worn out team that was desperate for 2022. Their issues were well documented - continuing in F1 but essentially taking a year out. No development to their 2021 car after its launch, two rookie drivers, one of them backed by an oligarch who put his son in one of the seats. He was overmatched, and did nothing  particularly positive in a forgettable season for a team that was putting its time and money into the new regulations. 

A bizarre narrative from Netflix’s Drive to Survive attempted to cram several narratives into one episode, showing the size of the task facing Haas and trying - for reasons unknown - to give the oligarch’s son a redemption story. Watching that in current world events looked like incredibly bad optics at best and plain sinister at worst. 

The oligarch’s son no longer has a seat and they just finished fifth and eleventh in the first race of the new era for the sport. A feel-good weekend for a team that, for a while, had travelled across the world without a point since October 2020, when Romain Grosjean snagged a couple of points at the Nürburgring. Renewed and sustained success on the track should bring sponsors and visibility and new money. They’re a well-liked team again, instead of being Formula 1’s floor, they might return to the midcard, where they were before running out of money. 

Suddenly everything about the team is upbeat and positive with a bright future (albeit after one race) and the team is no longer a punchline. Well, nearly everything. The team gambled on keeping Mick Schumacher on track during the late safety car period, with the German on 13-lap old tyres. But he fell to 11th as drivers with fresher tyres passed him, leaving him one place out of the points. While it’s his highest-ever finish, that first F1 point has eluded him so far, and it’s a bit more difficult for him this year. 

Of course Haas had luck along the way in Bahrain, every small team that achieves something needs a break - often they come at the expense of others. Esteban Ocon took a five-second penalty and had that not happened, he would have been in contention for the top five. Red Bull’s double DNF helped promote Magnussen up the order to fifth, behind the Ferrari and Mercedes pairs. When Magnussen finished in the same position in Austria 2018, he had luck then too - both Mercedes were among the six that didn’t make it home, pushing him forward. 

When Schumacher was racing against his previous teammate, the car wasn’t good and they were fighting among themselves for last place. Schumacher won that battle, finishing ahead 16 times last season, and even finished two places outside the points during the crash-tastic Hungarian GP in his rookie year. But now he has an experienced teammate, and so it’s fair to compare their performances as the season develops. If Schumacher - a member of the Ferrari Academy - is to graduate to the famous red team, this is the year he will have to push forward and put in comparable performances to his team-mate. 

This graph above is a very rough illustration of the point I’m making. Of the eight teams that returned both drivers, Haas had the biggest gap, with that eventual gap pushing one driver out of the points. And it’s also fair to consider what would have happened if Red Bull had finished. 

 
 
 
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Most teams have a pair of drivers that have similar skill levels. There are still unknown quantities at Alfa Romeo, and Aston Martin didn’t have their number one driver this weekend, but in roughly equal machinery, drivers should finish in similar positions. It is also very unfair to compare him to Magnussen after one race, but this may well be something to watch over the course of the season. 

It may end up being the making of Schumacher, or it might be a test he is unable to overcome. It adds another storyline to a season that is going to have plenty, with Haas providing the trope of the late re-entrant with unfinished business in the sport. This is Magnussen’s third spell on the grid, being unceremoniously dumped by McLaren in 2015, before having his Haas seat taken away from him as they sold a seat to try and stay in the game, and the team taking a decision to take a gap year, or in Haas-ese, a gaap yeaar. 

Fifth is an incredible result for the team, but even a single point would have been some much-needed green shoots. As season openers go, Bahrain 2022 was a more sedate weekend - with the new rules, it could have reasonable to expect more than three DNFs and more of a dramatic shift in the traditional order. 

Perhaps three days of testing and the familiarity of the Bahrain track helped mitigate the changes. Saudi Arabia is the second part of the season-opening double-header. The more unfamiliar track in Jeddah might be the start of the truly chaotic part of the 2022 season, although it would have to be especially impactful to beat the drama of 2021. Haas weren’t involved in much of the race, bowing out with a pair of retirements after 20 laps. It would be a massive statement of intent if Magnussen and Schumacher can take points there. 

The last word should go to Guenther Steiner - the real star of Drive to Survive. Listen to the joy in his voice here. "Haas F1 is back!"

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