F1 folk: The 'lucky' engineer who guided Grosjean and helped build Haas

That smell... When they brought the car back to the garage, that whole look and that smell - the smell of a burnt chassis, fire extinguisher - I will never forget. It's still terrifying.

I was sitting on the pit wall - and at first, when the flame went up, I didn't realise it was Romain. I didn't see him go off because I was looking at other things. But once you realise it's him... The car is in the fireball, you don't see him come out. It felt like an eternity. And it wasn't my driver in the car, it was my friend.

Then someone told me "Romain is out, Romain is out" - and I just couldn't believe it. "Really? Are you sure? Did you really see it?"

Then I saw him on the TV screen. But, strange as it may sound, I still couldn't believe it. The TV picture wasn't enough. I had to go to the medical centre - just before they took him to hospital - just to see his face, to see him move.

I can't remember who was there, someone from the FIA, they let me in - so I managed to see him, on the stretcher, just before they put him in the helicopter. He gave me the thumbs up. Okay. He's alive.

Grosjean was fortunate to emerge unscathed from his horrifying opening lap crash in the 2020 Bahrain Grand Prix

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

I wasn't very good at maths and physics at school. To be honest, I wanted to be an investigative journalist. My father was a musicologist and he wrote a book about Beethoven, so that's probably why I was into literature, I read a lot and I used to write. I actually won an award for a novel I wrote when I was about 10 years old. And then my dad's friend who worked for a newspaper had done a story, a real investigative piece, about corruption involving politicians - something that even the police would never touch - and published it. That really amazed me. I thought, 'Wow, that's what I want to do!'

But then I got into motorbikes. There was a guy from a school next door to mine - same town, same age - and he was doing off-road motocross or something like that with his dad in the States. I didn't know him very well at the time, just by name, Norick Abe - he had a pretty successful career and then went on to race in MotoGP.

I also wanted to do something on an international level, but I never thought about being a rider or a driver. I just decided that I wanted to be an engineer in motor racing - but even as a child I realised that engineers don't have as much influence on bikes as they do on cars. And that was also the time when McLaren had Honda engines and the whole Senna versus Prost story was unfolding. Formula 1 races were on free TV in Japan and I liked to watch them. So I thought I'd try to make a career as an F1 engineer.

I did most of the races with [Sato] in his first season, when he finished third in the championship behind Antonio Pizzonia and Tomas Scheckter, and then maybe half the season the following year when he won the title - as a part-time, unpaid job while I was working on my PhD. It was a great experience

That was it. I did some research - there were a lot of teams in England and obviously none in Japan. So I figured I had to go to England after high school. And I had to learn English first!

I looked at the cost of studying English in Japan compared to studying English in London, and even with a plane ticket and accommodation costs, it was the same price. But in Tokyo you only speak English in the classroom, right? Whereas in England it's everywhere.

When you're 18, you don't have a lot of fears, you're not set in your ways of doing certain things in your life. For me, it was exciting and new rather than challenging. I didn't really think about it too much - apart from asking myself obvious questions. Is it realistic? Can I afford it financially?

I managed to get some money from the government as a grant. And financially, it wasn't a night and day difference between studying in Japan and England. At the time it was about £6,000 versus £7,500 a year, and the cost of living in Tokyo was also quite high compared to England - especially as I ended up at Loughborough University and living in the countryside.

So it was an easy decision. But looking back, I think it was good that I didn't spend too much time thinking about it - because if you think too much then you might get scared. But when you're young, you see an opportunity, not a challenge.

Taking the plunge in moving to the UK was key to Komatsu immersing himself in the motorsport world

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

For an industrial placement, I got a gig at Lotus Engineering. And my boss there was into racing. He had an old Formula 3 car, so I went to races with him, just to help out and learn as much as I could. This gave me a foundation and my first insight into the practical side of going racing. And I spent a lot of time at race tracks.

It was at Silverstone. I was lying underneath a saloon car I was mechanicing for a local young driver back at Uni, changing the front anti-roll bar, and I looked up and there was this Japanese guy. I had no idea who he was, but I just said hello and we had a brief exchange that I soon almost forgot about. And then, before our race, I wanted to borrow a quad bike to make it easier to get our stuff into the pit lane - we didn't have one, and I thought, 'Oh, there's this Japanese guy who says he's doing Formula 3, so maybe he's got one'.

So I went and borrowed a quad bike from him and returned it afterwards. That's how I met Takuma Sato, which turned out to be one of the most important meetings of my career.

I watched him race. Of course, I followed Formula 3 a little bit - and I knew there was this guy called Martin O'Connell, the British driver - he had no money, but he was pretty good, he was destroying everyone in the national class. And Taku had beaten him! And that's when I really thought, 'Oh my God, who is this kid?'

Then we got to talking and immediately got along. It turned out that we had our birthdays on the same day with a year difference, both moved to the UK, tried to get into F1 and all that. I explained what I was doing and he said he was going to do British F3 with Carlin the following year and then asked, "Are you interested in doing something together?"

So, as I was doing my PhD, I said to my supervisor, "Look, I've met this guy, he's a racing driver, and he's trying to do British Formula 3. I think I can take a lot of stuff from my theoretical simulations and see how it works in the real world". And he said, "OK, no problem. I'll pay for your petrol." Great! That's even more than I asked for!

So I went along with Taku and Carlin, testing and racing. Of course, the team people were quite sceptical at first, but then they suddenly realised that I could be quite useful.

I did most of the races with him in his first season, when he finished third in the championship behind Antonio Pizzonia and Tomas Scheckter, and then maybe half the season the following year when he won the title - as a part-time, unpaid job while I was working on my PhD. It was a great experience.

Meeting with Sato during his F3 days proved an invaluable breakthrough for Komatsu

Photo by: Paul Sutton / Motorsport Images

At university, all the theoretical work, everything was on the computer, and here I was able to get real data from the car, talk to the driver, talk to the mechanics, try to put my theoretical knowledge into practice, make it useful. And that's really still the basis of what I do now. And then my first paid job was in Formula 1.

I had actually accepted another job offer from a company called TRW, not in racing. But then the ownership changed and they made me redundant before I even started - I got three months' pay without doing a single day's work. It was great at first because I got another three months to finish my PhD. But then it was back to 'Oh shit, I've got no job'. And I almost ended up working for Colin Kolles.

It was close! I even went to see Colin in Germany, he offered me the role of race engineer in his German Formula 3 team - but it just didn't feel right. I remember coming back to the UK, back to university, back to my research office - and I'm sitting there thinking, 'OK, I've got this job offer, which isn't too bad. But it's in Germany. But then it's as a race engineer and it's Formula 3. But it's with Colin Kolles'. Well, you know...

It's late, it's dark outside and I have all these doubts. Should I do it? Should I not? And right at that moment Takuma calls: "How are you, Ayao?"

Sometimes we were testing 30-40 different tyres a day. We had a guy from Michelin to support us, we went to all the tracks in Europe - Paul Ricard, Jerez, Valencia - just to do tyre tests, chasing performance

I explained to him where I was, that I had this offer from Kolles and that I'd probably have to accept it. And he just said: "Can you back out? You probably want to go and talk to Shoichi Tanaka from Honda Racing Development, they are interested in talking to you".

Okay! I went to see Tanaka-san and Otmar Szafnauer - and they gave me a job in F1. It was a time when testing was unrestricted. I was in a vehicle dynamics group, so every single test there was something new, either a damper or a new suspension setting or whatever - and a lot of things that were directly applicable to what I was studying for my PhD, so it was really good.

But then, after maybe a year or a year and a half, I quickly moved on to tyres. The tyre war was still going on and the teams were squeezing a huge amount of performance out of the tyres - so my last year at BAR, 2005, I was just working on tyres, doing a lot of analysis with Michelin. I loved it.

Insight: Why tyre wars have largely become a thing of the past in motorsport

And I think the Michelin guys thought I was doing a good job too, so I was soon approached by Renault and I went there - to do exactly the same thing, but with the team that was fighting for wins and titles. It was a great time. Sometimes we were testing 30-40 different tyres a day. We had a guy from Michelin to support us, we went to all the tracks in Europe - Paul Ricard, Jerez, Valencia - just to do tyre tests, chasing performance.

Komatsu followed Sato into F1 and relished tyre test work with BAR before taking on the same role at Renault

Photo by: Brendon Thorne

When the tyre war ended, I wanted to be a performance engineer - and they put me in a test team for 2007. Then in 2008 I went to a race team in the same role - and after another three years I became a race engineer - for Vitaly Petrov, and we got a podium in our first race in Melbourne, which was amazing!

It was the first race with Pirelli tyres and we managed to make the two-stop strategy work when some of our rivals did three - and during that period I think we had a lot of races with pretty good tyre management. A few more with Vitaly and then also with Romain. I worked with him as a performance engineer in 2009 when he had his first stint with Renault. And then he came back in 2012 after winning the GP2 title.

Romain is an incredible driver. It's impossible to believe what he can do with the car at times, pushing it to the absolute limit. We've been through a lot together and I don't know... I'm still disappointed that we didn't win a race. Because with his raw speed, he should have been winning races in F1. On his day he was as fast as anyone out there - nobody could drive better than him. But it's just that not every day was his day.

That first year with Lotus was terrible. I can't even remember how many crashes he had on the opening laps - but the one at Spa is hard to forget. He got a race ban, but then had another crash at Suzuka sending Mark Webber into a spin. It wasn't easy.

I didn't really know what I could do. It was my second year as a race engineer, so I was relatively inexperienced. So, looking back, I feel that if I had five years of experience at the time, I could have helped more. It's not something that, being in my second year as a race engineer, I was qualified enough to deal with, if you like.

Of course, I tried to help and support him as much as I could as a human being. But I was still relatively young in terms of life experience. I still feel bad about it, to be honest. I was his race engineer and it's all about the whole package - and I think I could have and should have helped more. I don't think I did enough.

But 2013 was good. Romain clearly made a good step forward. He did a lot of things differently within himself, with the people he worked with, to make it work. So he did a lot of experimenting to improve his preparation, his mental side - and then in some races we were actually racing against a much faster Red Bull. I remember at Suzuka he was leading from the start and they only managed to get us at the pit stops. We had a lot of podiums in 2013, but I still say his best race was at Spa in 2015.

Komatsu built up a strong rapport with Grosjean, having first worked with him in 2009, then followed him to Haas

Photo by: Andrew Ferraro

That year as a company, as team Lotus, we were dying. We had no money. In Budapest we didn't have tyres until 45 minutes into the session because we hadn't paid for them. Later in the year, at Suzuka, Bernie [Ecclestone] had to feed us to keep us going. And that weekend at Spa, we arrived at the track and our garage was literally locked - we weren't sure if we were going to be able to race at all. Obviously that is not the way you want to start a weekend. But the way Romain drove to get on the podium... it was just unbelievable.

If it wasn't for Romain, I wouldn't be at Haas. I loved it at Enstone. The guys there were fantastic. They worked hard, and had an incredible team spirit even through the financial difficulties we had - and that's why we were still able to perform at a decent level. I was chief race engineer there and it worked pretty well - and I think Romain saw that too. So when he signed with Haas, he just said to me, "Can you go and have a chat with Guenther?"

And I had a chat. And I liked Guenther's vision. I thought it was a very interesting project with a lot of potential. But if it wasn't for Romain, I don't think I would have joined.

It was an interesting experience to start a new team from scratch. And I tell you, that winter of 2016 was hell. It just completely destroyed all of us - even before the first tests. Just building the first car was a huge challenge.

You can't underestimate how rewarding it is when you get a good result. To be honest, if Romain hadn't got P6 on Sunday, I don't know what would have happened. I really think we'd lose a lot of people if it wasn't for that result

I remember leaving Dallara and driving to the airport with a bunch of guys in a van. Everyone was pretty much done. It was dark, I was knackered, and the guy next to me was completely knocked out, like he was dead. And I was like 'Oh shit, we haven't turned a wheel yet!' - because, honestly, it felt like we had the whole season behind us.

Then we had the winter test - and that wasn't much sleep either. And then there was Melbourne. The longest flight of the year, jet lag - but just to make sure we were ready for the race weekend, we had to work through the nights. I think we worked all through Wednesday night and then finally got a couple of hours of sleep on Thursday.

And you can't underestimate how rewarding it is when you get a good result. To be honest, if Romain hadn't got P6 on Sunday, I don't know what would have happened. I really think we'd lose a lot of people if it wasn't for that result. That and the next race in Bahrain, when he was fifth and overtaking people left and right... that just saved us.

Of course, he's more than a driver to me. He's a friend. Our kids are the same age. So after that crash in what turned out to be his last race in F1, my head was full of 'what ifs'. What if he had lost consciousness, even for a few seconds? What if he couldn't free his left foot? What if he had made one wrong decision and delayed himself getting out of the car?

Debut points for Haas scored by Grosjean at Melbourne in 2016 were important for morale of shattered team

Photo by: Dirk Klynsmith / Motorsport Images

Don't get me wrong, but one of the biggest moments for me was when his car came back - and I saw the footage from the cockpit camera. I wanted to understand how we could improve the car in terms of safety.

But what was more important for me, in a way, was the realisation of how much he fought for his life, for his family. The time he spent there, sitting in that cockpit, was just under the limit of what these racing overalls can take. Literally. Just under. And that's why his whole body was fine, apart from his hands.

But at that moment, when he was trying to get out - if he had panicked for just a second or two, it would have been different. But as soon as he realised he was stuck, he went back down into the cockpit to pull his leg. And that was 100% the right decision, as was every other decision he made in those seconds.

He never gave up, he never hesitated, he never panicked - for his family, for his children. And that's why he's still alive. And that was very moving, really emotional and inspirational for me.

I consider myself lucky. Some things in life you can't plan. And I am grateful that I have met a lot of good people along the way and that I have had opportunities. Because when you think about it, there's so much chance in life. Like my internship at Lotus Engineering. I applied to probably 50 companies, got rejections from probably 30 of them straight away, and probably 15 of them didn't even reply.

I only had two interview offers, and then Lotus Engineering decided to give me a job. And then my boss happened to be into racing! And if that hadn't happened, I wouldn't have met Taku in Silverstone a year later…

It's the same with this team. I didn't think about change at all. I was at Enstone and I liked Enstone as a team. And then, during my time at Enstone, I was able to progress from the vehicle performance group to performance engineer, race engineer and chief race engineer. I was quite happy there. But then this opportunity came up - and you don't get a new team every year. And this was a chance to do something big, to have a massive influence on the development of something new. And that's why I took it, and I'm just 100 percent focused on making this team better, every day.

Komatsu says he feels lucky to be living his dreams with Haas

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

We are a true race team. We don't have, let's say, inertia or bureaucracy, like some other teams. If we have to make a decision, we make a decision. I don't worry about what other people think. I don't have to think about whether I'm going to get fired if I make the wrong decision. Because if I make a wrong decision and I have to explain it to my boss, I will - I don't have to hide anything.

Here, at Haas, you don't have to be afraid to make decisions. As long as most of them are right, that's what really matters. Nobody can be 100% right all the time. But if you're afraid to make your own decisions, it's never going to work.

There is still a lot to learn and improve here. Building a new team has been a huge challenge. It's hard. Sometimes very hard. But I still enjoy it a lot

I like the culture we have and I just try to keep it that way. There is no backstabbing. You try to do your best, but things happen - and if you don't get it right, we don't crucify people. Just make sure you go back and get it right next time. And that's what I really like about this team.

PLUS: Why the reality of F1 engineering debriefs isn't what Drive to Survive makes out

I joined Haas in 2016 and we've come a long way. But there is still a lot to learn and improve here. Building a new team has been a huge challenge. It's hard. Sometimes very hard. But I still enjoy it a lot. And when you enjoy it, you can put a lot of effort into it. And if you don't, this job is just impossible.

Komatsu remains dedicated to the task of lifting Haas up the grid

Photo by: Jake Grant / Motorsport Images