Gutierrez ‘more comfortable and confident’

After a wretched start to his first season with Haas, Esteban Gutierrez says he is feeling “more comfortable and confident” the more he knows the car.

Bad luck and poor reliability marred the start of Gutierrez’s campaign, however, in recent weeks he has claimed back-to-back P11s.

Knocking on the door of his first points, the Mexican racer says he is feeling better about life with Haas.

“The more we know the car, the more comfortable and confident I feel,” he explained. “Every time we go out, I know a better direction to follow with the setup.”

“It’s been a challenging start to the season, but now we have some consistency and we can build a lot from that. I’ll keep pushing.

“And the team is doing a great job of learning more about the car, becoming more efficient in developing the car’s setup throughout the race weekend.

“We’re on track to achieve the results we want and earn as many points as possible.”

Looking ahead to the next race, the Canadian Grand Prix, Gutierrez reckons that in their VF16, Haas have a car that could do well as long as they can get the tyres working.

“Montreal is a pretty low downforce track. It’s very smooth and there are many, many long straights,” he said.

“It’s usually a challenge to make the tyres work, and I think that’s going to be the key point of the whole weekend.”

He added: “It’s very similar to Monza, with a lot of long straights and low downforce. It’s important to have a good car mechanically. Hopefully, our car is well adapted to the circuit.”