Haas expecting to “suffer more” than F1 rivals at Mexican GP

The Haas Formula 1 team is expecting to “suffer more” than its rivals at this weekend’s Mexican Grand Prix.

After enduring a difficult season in which the American squad has slipped to ninth in the constructors’ standings amid a number of performance-related problems, Haas heads to Mexico City braced for another challenging weekend.

The Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez’s high-altitude circuit places greater strain on cooling and engine-performance for teams, leaving Haas concerned about an area that has proved to be one of its biggest weaknesses in recent years.

Speaking about the challenges of the Mexico City venue, Steiner explained: “We always have cooling challenges. Going up into the altitude there, you always need cooling on the cars.

“You need a lot more, and that takes downforce away, and you never have enough downforce. It looks like we always suffer more on that one than all the other cars.

“That is our biggest challenge, to find the balance between cooling and having downforce available.”

Grosjean hopes a better understanding of its issues will help limit any potential struggles.

“Mexico’s been a tough one for us since our first year back in 2016,” he said. “We’re just going to keep working on it and keep trying to improve our results there.

“It’s going to be a challenge. Obviously, the altitude is the same for everyone, but it looks like it’s impacted us quite a fair bit in the past.

“Maybe this year we’ll have a better understanding and we can get everything to work. Let’s see where we can go. We know it’s going to be a challenge.

“It’s always been our hardest track, but we’re ready for that challenge. Anything we can learn, we’ll take it.”

Magnussen, who scored Haas’ only points finish in the last six races in Russia, added: “Mexico City has proven in the past to be a pretty challenging circuit for us.

“The track surface and low downforce means that we struggle more with the tyres. I don’t know what we can do in terms of driving style, but we’ve made some good steps in terms of our understanding of the car this year. Hopefully, we’ll be alright.”

Haas currently sits seven points behind eighth-placed Alfa Romeo in the constructors’ standings with four races remaining.