For Steiner, frustrating Sundays keep happening for Haas
In Spain, both Haas cars made it to Q3. However, the American team did not score any points in the race the next day.
This weekend in Barcelona, Haas was the only team that did not bring any upgrades to their VF-22. Some might have feared a difficult Grand Prix for the American team. However, on Saturday during the qualifying session, Mick Schumacher and Kevin Magnussen were among the ten drivers to participate in Q3, a first for the German driver.
But in the race, everything is going to become more complicated. Kevin Magnussen saw his race nearly over after only four corners due to an incident with Lewis Hamilton. Mick Schumacher, on his side, was in sixth place at the end of the first lap, which could have given hope for the German’s first points in Formula 1. But the pace of the Haas was not sufficient and Schumacher could only bring back a 14th place. As for Magnussen, he finished 17th.
Günther Steiner expressed his frustration with the lack of points scored, especially after a promising qualifying session. It affects you because these are missed opportunities. The car seems to have good pace, as we qualified eighth and tenth, so we have to score points at some point. Therefore, we have missed opportunities, a bit unlucky in some places with the safety car and obviously, it becomes frustrating. It’s not that bad for us, it’s like we need a little bit of sunshine on Sundays.
This Grand Prix of Spain didn’t deviate from the norm and the Haas team plummeted in the rankings, despite various reasons. « If you have an incident on the first lap, that’s how it goes. It’s a big frustration to finish where we were after turn 4. I think Lewis slightly understeered and he crashed into us, and that’s it,” adds Steiner. « The strategy we tried obviously didn’t work, but we had nothing to lose. We tried to do something different, but it wouldn’t have made a difference anyway. »
Steiner hopes for a good result in Monaco, on a circuit where a large part of the weekend is determined by qualifying. « Absolutely, I hope we will do something good again, like we did here in qualifying. In Monaco, 95% of the race is always done on Saturday. So that’s what you need to focus on. It won’t be easy and it’s a new experience with these cars. And, as always, you just try to do the best you can. »
Haas hasn’t scored any points since Imola. Worse, if we remove Kevin Magnussen’s fifth place in Bahrain during the first Grand Prix of the season, the American team would only have five measly points.
