Haas has promoted Laura Mueller to the role of race engineer for Esteban Ocon with Carine Cridelich set to join as head of strategy from Racing Bulls. With this, Mueller becomes the first ever female race engineer in F1.
Haas finished seventh in the constructors’ championship last year, their best finish since 2018. The team is looking to build on that in 2025 with a new line-up that features Esteban Ocon and Ferrari junior Ollie Bearman.
Mueller headlines the raft of changes, being promoted from her role as performance engineer to race engineer – one of the most senior trackside roles for a team and the main link between a driver and the team.
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, and then she’s very hardworking. Her work ethic is really, really good. She’s going to be Esteban’s race engineer,” he said. “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.”
Meanwhile, Ronan O’Hare has also been promoted from performance engineer to race engineer for Bearman. 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, which has been vacant for a year, with Francesco Nenci, who previously worked in F1 with Sauber and Toyota and more recently held the role of performance team leader on Audi’s Dakar Rally project.
Komatsu 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.”
