{"id":25131,"date":"2024-10-11T05:41:20","date_gmt":"2024-10-11T09:41:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/?p=25131"},"modified":"2024-10-11T05:44:41","modified_gmt":"2024-10-11T09:44:41","slug":"why-haas-can-aim-high-with-their-toyota-partnership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/10\/11\/why-haas-can-aim-high-with-their-toyota-partnership\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Haas can aim high with their Toyota partnership"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The announcement of a multi-year technical collaboration between <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/08\/24\/komatsu-haas-now-proven-as-capable-of-effective-upgrades\/\" target=\"_self\">Haas<\/a> and Toyota took the F1 world by surprise. This unexpected announcement could be a game-changer for Haas, both from a performance and commercial perspective. Looking ahead to 2026 and beyond, the US team can be excited about their trajectory.<\/p>\n<h2>Toyota agreement strengthens Haas technical team and increases manpower<\/h2>\n<p>Since becoming Haas team principal, Ayao Komatsu has made a series of big decisions. Even before the season began, his decision to focus exclusively on tyre management in testing (to remove Haas&#8217; biggest limitation from 2023) was crucial in ensuring the VF-24&#8217;s race pace was sufficient for points.<\/p>\n<p>Throughout the course of 2024, the Japanese team boss has identified several points of weakness to address.<\/p>\n<p>Arguably the most pressing was issue the relative lack of resources at the team. <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/03\/27\/haas-reveals-plans-to-increase-staff-and-bridge-gap-to-rivals\/\" target=\"_self\">Komatsu explained at the beginning of the year<\/a> that increasing the number of personnel at Haas was a top priority.<\/p>\n<p>Until now, the US squad have employed fewer staff than <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/10\/10\/red-bull-to-compare-lawson-and-tsunoda-ahead-of-2025-verdict\/\" target=\"_self\">any other F1 team<\/a> &#8211; and by some margin. Alongside their limited infrastructure and design facilities, this was a major limitation.<\/p>\n<p>However, the news of Haas&#8217; partnership with Toyota changes the playing field. Komatsu&#8217;s personnel will benefit from the significant resources at Toyota&#8217;s disposal &#8211; in terms of design, engineering and other technical insights.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-25132 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-600x400.jpg 600w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2024\/10\/008-327-1200x800.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/p>\n<h4>Haas start to bridge the gap to rival teams<\/h4>\n<p>More broadly, the involvement of Toyota employees will substantially <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/08\/12\/haas-f1-begin-crucial-recruitment-drive\/\" target=\"_self\">increase the number of personnel working on Haas&#8217; F1 project<\/a>. This will go a long way in reducing and potentially overcoming the American outfit&#8217;s deficit in resources compared to other teams.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to this, reaching a deal with such a big name in the car industry can be expected to bring commercial benefits. Aside from the arrival of Toyota itself as a partner, the Japanese brand&#8217;s presence will almost certainly help attract other sponsors.<\/p>\n<p>In fairness to Komatsu&#8217;s team, their improved results have already seen a steady rise in commercial agreements. With that said, adding such a well-known brand to the mix can only be a positive.<\/p>\n<p>Approaching things from a more long-term perspective, this move also gives Haas far greater potential. To be clear, they will continue to work closely with Ferrari.<\/p>\n<p>Ayao Komatsu has explained that reaching a deal with Toyota was only possible if it did not interfere with the team&#8217;s Haas partnership. For obvious reasons, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/10\/04\/ferrari-capitalise-on-renault-departure-and-sign-several-engineers\/\" target=\"_self\">Ferrari<\/a> remain an essential partner.<\/p>\n<p>Still, Toyota&#8217;s presence inevitably gives the US team more firepower than it had at its disposal previously. As time passes, the Japanese brand&#8217;s relationship with Haas could evolve and even strengthen &#8211; possibly unlocking new possibilities.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, Haas know better than to get ahead of themselves. Most teams across the grid have invested significantly in improving their facilities and securing partnerships with big manufacturers.<\/p>\n<p>In many ways, Komatsu&#8217;s team still lack the resources to fight near the front. However, strong foundations are being laid for progress in the future.<\/p>\n<p>Having spent so long punching above their weight in F1, Haas will have a lot more to work with moving forward.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The announcement of a multi-year technical collaboration between Haas and Toyota took the F1 world by surprise. This unexpected announcement could be a game-changer for Haas, both from a performance and commercial perspective. Looking ahead to 2026 and beyond, the US team can be excited about their trajectory. Toyota agreement strengthens Haas technical team and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4927,"featured_media":25134,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4,3],"tags":[2220,68,465,346,447,2248],"class_list":["post-25131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-formula-1","category-news","tag-2024-formula-1-season","tag-f1","tag-f1-news","tag-haas","tag-toyota","tag-vf-24"],"modified_by":"Jaden Diaz-Ndisang","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4927"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}