Haas have promoted Laura Mueller to the role of Race Engineer for new recruit Esteban Ocon with Carine Cridelich set to join as Head of Strategy from rivals Racing Bulls as part of a wider strengthening of the structure.
Haas finished seventh in the constructors’ championship last year, their best finish since 2018, and are looking to build on that in 2025 with a new line-up that features race winner Ocon and Ferrari junior Ollie Bearman.
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Mueller headlines the raft of changes, earning promotion from her role as Performance Engineer to become the first full-time female to take on the high-profile position of Race Engineer.
A race engineer is one of the most senior trackside roles for a team as they are the main link between a driver and the team, both on-track through radio communications, and off it in the pursuit of performance.
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Mueller will act as Esteban Ocon’s Race Engineer
Haas boss Ayao Komatsu said Mueller, who joined Haas in 2022 working in the simulator department, is the right fit for Ocon, who joins from Alpine.
“She’s a pretty determined character,” said Komatsu. “And then she’s very hardworking. Her work ethic is really, really good.
“She’s going to be Esteban’s Race Engineer. In terms of looking at it personality-wise, Esteban is a pretty determined character as well. So that side, I think the driving force, I think that personality matches pretty well.
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“And then what she’s really good at is, when she sees a problem, she digs deep, and she doesn’t stop at the first answer. Some people, when they find the answer, first answer, they stop there. They think, ‘Oh, great, I found the solution, move on’.
“She has a good work ethic such that when she finds the first solution, she knows that there’s 10 things, now you’ve got new questions to answer.
“Her determination is the one that impresses me the most.”
Haas have made a number of personnel changes for 2025
He added: “If you look at how many female engineers we have in the office, it’s definitely more than before. But it’s not like I chose Laura because she’s female.
“We don’t care [about] nationality, gender – it really doesn’t matter because what matters is work. How you can fit into the team, how you can maximise the performance. I believe it is the right choice.”
Ronan O’Hare has also been promoted from his role as Performance Engineer to Race Engineer for Bearman, who stood-in for Kevin Magnussen as a race driver twice in 2023 and has already embedded himself well with the team.
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Cridelich will join Haas in March, ending a search for a Head of Strategy that Komatsu said has been going on “for a long, long time”.
Mark Lowe returns to Haas in the newly-created role of Sporting Director, while long-time Team Manager Pete Crolla has departed.
Haas have also filled the role of Chief Race Engineer that has been vacant for a year with Francesco Nenci joining, having previously worked in F1 with Sauber and Toyota and more recently holding the role of performance team leader on Audi’s Dakar Rally project.
Komatsu said the tweaks to the Haas trackside team are a “huge change”
Komatsu said the tweaks to the trackside team are a “huge change” but on review, in what was his first season in charge as Team Principal, he felt that was “one of the weakest areas last year”.
He added: “The more and more the car became competitive, it kind of exposed it more. In terms of execution, if we say we should have finished P6, but we didn’t. Part of it, we left too many points on the table from the trackside operation. So, we really needed to step up on that one.”
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It’s a lot of change at once – and the biggest suite of changes the team has endured since they entered the sport in 2016 – but Komatsu reckoned now was the right time, especially given sweeping new rules to the aerodynamic and power unit rules will be introduced next year.
“I felt we had to do it at some point,” he said. “Then, when’s the right moment? It’s never the right moment. But we decided we’d rather do it this year than in ’26 with the complete new generation cars. So, at least the regulation, technical regulations are stable. What we’re dealing with sporting-wise is stable.
“The influx of those new people coming in. Yeah, no doubt it’s not going to be easy, but I felt we had to do it at some point. We can’t keep putting it off.”
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