For the first time in their history, Haas are readying to operate at cost cap level going into the F1 2025 campaign.

Since 2021, Formula 1 has limited the budget for each team per season, with a figure of $135 million in place for the 2024 season.

Haas to reach F1 budget cap ceiling

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher

And off the back of claiming a P7 finish in the 2024 Constructors’ standings, collecting 58 points, Haas team boss Ayao Komatsu said the funding has been secured to spend as the F1 big boys do.

“Our target is to be on the budget cap next year,” Komatsu confirmed to the media, including PlanetF1.com.

“That’s another thing. With Haas, we’ve never been on the budget cap, right? How can you be competitive? So if you’re serious about being competitive, you have got to be on the budget gap. So yes, that’s our target.”

Haas exceeded their initial season goal of P8 in the standings, and narrowly missed out on going one better, with Alpine only seven points up the road in P6.

But, Komatsu believes Haas’ reaction to that result is beneficial.

“I think it’s very, very good that we are disappointed not to get P6,” he said, “because as I said at the beginning of the season, our official target was P8, because, stating the obvious, to be P8 you need to beat two teams.

“I really was just thinking, ‘Who can we beat? What two teams we are going to beat, right?’ Coming from the disaster of last year, in the previous four years or something, we’ve only been finishing P9, P10, P8, right? So to get P8, it was a tough challenge.

“But I think we just showed this year, even though we are the smallest team by far, if we work as a team together, we can do this, which is something to be really proud of, I think, for everybody on the team.”

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However, not revelling too long in their P7 result, Haas want to push on further from here.

“I think you’ve got to look at it in a sense that, if somebody told us that we’re going to finish P7 this year, we’d have all signed it off at the start of the year,” said Komatsu.

“But, of course, the bar is raised, right? Every single time we do better, our expectations are higher, the bar of acceptance, you know, what we are fighting for this race, which is good.

“Everybody after the race was, of course, disappointed to miss out on P6, but at the same time, we exceeded our expectations.

“And then everybody says it’s good to be disappointed missing out on P6, because that’s where our bar is now.”

Haas will sport a new driver line-up for F1 2025, with Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen out, while Esteban Ocon and Oliver Bearman come in.

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