Haas has become the first Formula 1 team to unveil its 2022 car, via a digital render, as the sport enters a brand new era that is hoped will shake up the grid.
The VF-22 car continues the red, white and blue Russian colour scheme which Haas took on last year when Russia’s Nikita Mazepin entered the sport with serious financial backing from team title sponsor Uralkali.
He and Mick Schumacher each failed to score a point in their 2021 rookie season as Haas totally ignored developing the car, hoping to get a jump-start on the new regulations for 2022.
On Friday night the “design and livery” of the VF-22 was revealed on social media, though the full brand-new car with all of the tweaks won’t be seen until testing later this month.
The team purposefully removed some of the major aerodynamic changes from the renders so that rival teams wouldn’t see them.
“It’s exciting to be at the point where we know the VF-22 will be on-track shortly,” said Haas F1 team principal Gunther Steiner.
“We all know what the team is capable of, we’ve proved that in the past, and with this new car – born out of a completely new set of regulations and with our new design team in place, I’m confident we can showcase once again that we can compete on weekends.
“It’s been a tremendous effort by everyone involved and now comes the fun part of getting the new car to the circuit and dialling in all the elements. Last season was a long one but I’m confident that 2022 will see us back in the mix with the VF-22.”
F1’s new regulations were delayed a year due to the pandemic but are the biggest overhaul to the set of rules governing the sport in 40 years.
The return of ground effect - a reliance on the floor to generate downforce, rather than sophisticated bodywork that creates dirty air and makes it impossible to follow a car even if you’re faster than them - comes along with larger and colder tyres, a reduced budget cap and restrictions on aerodynamic testing.
All signs are the gap between the fastest and slowest cars on the grid will shrink, with F1 head of aerodynamics Jason Somerville “it’s very unlikely you will not see a closing of the grid”, and it’s unclear which teams will dominate when the season opens in Bahrain on March 10-12.
All other constructors, except for Williams, will reveal their 2022 cars across the next three weeks.
Red Bull (February 9) will be followed by Aston Martin (February 10), Daniel Ricciardo’s McLaren (February 11) and AlphaTauri (February 14).
The much-anticipated new Ferrari (February 17) will come a day before the debut of the brand new Mercedes (February 18), which will be hoping to dominate this new era as it did the hybrid one.
Alpine (February 21) and Alfa Romeo (February 27) will finish things off.
Pre-season testing will be held in Barcelona on February 23-25.
