Kevin Magnussen and Haas on the verge of a dream United States Grand Prix

AUSTIN — As dawn breaks this Sunday at the Circuit of the Americas ahead of the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix, Haas is on the verge of a dream trip to Austin.

A stunning double-points finish from Nico Hülkenberg and Kevin Magnussen in Saturday’s F1 Sprint Race saw the team pull level with Visa Cash App RB F1 Team on points for sixth in the Constructors’ Championship. Thanks to a pair of sixth-place finishes from Hülkenberg earlier in the year, Haas now leads VCARB in that battle due to tiebreaker rules.

Thanks to Magnussen who qualified ninth for Sunday’s main event — ahead of Yuki Tsunoda, the lead VCARB — Haas is in pull further ahead.

Speaking with the media, including SB Nation, after qualifying on Saturday Magnussen noted it was a “pleasure” driving the VF-24 so far this week in Austin.

“It’s always more fun running, you know, further forward,” said Magnussen. “Just a pleasure driving the car this weekend. It’s been really good on this track. You know, we are seeing some sort of mixed up field here, and luckily we are on the good end of that.”

Haas brought an upgrade package to Austin for the United States Grand Prix but rolled that out conservatively. The team decided to split the upgrade, installing it first on Hülkenberg’s VF-24 ahead of the first practice session and waiting on data from those results before deciding whether to install the package on Magnussen’s car.

With both drivers finishing in the points — Hülkenberg with the upgraded car, Magnussen on an older specification — there was some question after the F1 Sprint Race whether Haas would proceed as planned and install the upgrade on Magnussen’s car ahead of qualifying.

The driver himself wondered about that plan following qualifying. Ultimately, however, Haas went forward with the installation, and Magnussen noted after qualifying that he was “happy” with how the process unfolded.

“Yeah, I’m happy with that, and great to feel the upgrade working well. I think it’s not night and day, but it’s good that we put it on and we aren’t going slower, you know, and there will be more investigations and I’m sure, you know, the data that we’ve seen so far indicating that it is an improvement will turn out to be correct,” said Magnussen.

“But, you know, that’s always an unknown, especially going into qualifying with no chance to sort of, you know, correct any sort of little differences that there might be, bodywork to body work and floor to floor.

“So, yeah, great job from the team to make this upgrade and actually just be able to bolt it on and go.”

Magnussen was asked if he used the early portion of qualifying to try and get acclimated to the upgraded VF-24, and the Haas driver indicated that was indeed the case. Not just in Q1, but throughout the entire session.

This means there could be even more potential unlocked tomorrow.

“Yeah, [you’re] getting accustomed to it. But pretty much all the way through the qualifying,” began Magnussen. “I got into Q3 and I told the team, I hadn’t done a good lap. So there’s definitely potential there.”

Magnussen also noted that his final run in Q3 — which was aborted after George Russell’s hard shunt — was on pace to be a “great” lap on his last new set of soft tires. The Haas driver believes that is another sign there is even more potential come race time.

“And, you know, in Q3 I only had one set of new tires and that was at the end when we got the yellow flag, and that lap was gonna be a great lap.

“I look forward to going tomorrow.”