Mark Slade replaces Ed Regan , who will be leaving the Haas team at the end of the season and has moved into an office position prior to his official departure.
Slade will bring his wealth of experience gained at McLaren, Renault and Mercedes, and is clearly a valuable addition to the team. As Magnussen’s race engineer, the Dane and Slade already met in F1 in 2016, and now they meet again.
In addition to the Danish, he has been an engineer for other renowned drivers such as Hakkinen, Coulthard , Raikkonen , Fernando Alonso (in 2007), Pastor Maldonado, Kovalainen, Ocon or Jolyon Palmer.
He joined McLaren in 1991 and for 18 years with the Woking team he worked in a variety of engineering roles, notably with Mika Hakkinen, David Coulthard and Kimi Raikkonen, including during the two titles the latter came close to winning in 2003. and 2005.
He signed for Renault for the 2010 season, but then switched to Mercedes in 2011 to engineer for Michael Schumacher, aided by current Lewis Hamilton engineer Peter Bonnington .
However, he was only there for one season before returning to Renault in 2012. He stayed with the Enstone team during the years it became Lotus, when he returned to work with Raikkonen.
Between 2017 and 2019 he was an engineer for Nico Hulkenberg, who is in fact linked to Haas as a possible replacement for Mick Schumacher.
Slade’s last track role with Esteban Ocon’s Renault came in 2020, before a facelift to the team at the end of that season. He subsequently left the team, and has been out ever since.
He is highly regarded by drivers with whom he has formed a close bond, such as Heikki Kovalainen, who worked with him at McLaren in 2008 and 2009 and then briefly at Lotus in 2013.
Slade (on the right, slightly out of focus) accompanied Raikkonen in McLaren and Lotus
“I think having Mark Slade as the engineer was a big factor,” the Finn told Motorsport.com of their relationship.
“It was relatively easy to start working with him at Lotus, because I knew him from my time at McLaren, and I knew how he works.
“He also knew what I needed. If I got lost, he could give me advice just by looking at the telemetry, so that was very helpful.”
“I had a good time at McLaren with him and he’s worked with some really good drivers, and he’s obviously a great engineer.
Kevin Magnussen’s best result on his return to F1 to date remains fifth place on his comeback in Bahrain. The Dane is currently 12th in the drivers’ standings, 10 points ahead of team-mate Mick.
