After a catastrophic 2021 season, which saw the American-owned team finishing tenth with zero points, the squad’s morale has been uplifted by the progress it has made.

With its VF-22 proving to be a Q3 contender and capable of challenging for points, Haas seems a completely new team.

Obviously, this radical change of pace has not gone unnoticed. Several competitors have queen questioning whether Haas could have gained an edge thanks to its ultra-close partnership with Ferrari.

However, both Haas TP Gunther Steiner and the FIA have stated multiple times that the Haas-Ferrari partnership is operating within the regulations.

Simone Resta, the current technical director of Haas F1 Team, who previously worked at Scuderia Ferrari for almost twenty years, is resolute to waste no time worrying about what rivals think.

"You know, honestly, I just care about my job, the job we're doing with a car, trying to improve it, and trying to give a better car to the drivers”

"All those things are on a different level from where I operate at the moment. We know the rules we need to respect, we respect them, and we move forward. There's not much to say," he said.

While acknowledging some similarities in the design of Haas’ car and the F1-75, Resta reckons that there are many design concepts on other cars that look the same on the grid.

"You can look at the photos, and [you can see] a lot of cars with a lot of similarities," he explained.

"I think just everyone has to do a nice job and concentrate [on themselves].

"I suppose for a team like ours, being in the middle of the midfield, maybe someone wasn't expecting that. But, yeah, it's life. We just push the performance and do a better job, and then the car will be there."

Although team boss Gunther Steiner has shown pretty cautious about rushing through upgrades, the Italian engineer is not so prudent and is confident that his team has the potential to unlock more performance from its 2022 challenger.

Asked if he shared Steiner's views about holding fire on developments for a bit, Resta said: "I can only agree about what Gunther says and I understand his position in the way that yes, the cars are so different from last year, the tyres are different, so there's a lot to learn.

"The porpoising wasn't expected in the way that it did happen, so we need to understand it and there are lots of things to learn.

"It's also fair to say that the car, being in the first year of the new regulations, there is a lot also to unlock.

"Having said that, I think there is also something to be done on the car side and to improve it. Not to rush it, but, at the right time, to move the car forward. I think there is potential to do it."

Although the team had a difficult weekend in Australia, where it didn't hit the ground running with the right set-up, Resta thinks there is not much wrong with its car as it has scored points in every other race.

"The drivers are generally happy with it. If anything, we probably have to try to improve it a little bit in the high-speed sections, if I compare it to the others, but generally, the car is working well in all conditions.

"We just need to keep working hard, head down and try to improve race after race. I think we know the objectives that have been set by the team, so we need to do our best to make sure we can achieve them."