Thursday, October 3, 2024

Haas’ Guenther Steiner: “We have to regroup and see how we move forward from here”

Guenther Steiner says the MoneyGram Haas F1 Team will need to regroup after a disappointing British Grand Prix weekend saw them finish thirteenth with one car and retire with the other.

Kevin Magnussen was forced out after encountering an engine issue, with his stoppage on the Wellington Straight bringing out the safety car.  It was the third engine related problem in three races for the team, and they will be looking into the cause to prevent more issues going forward.

Nico Hülkenberg started eleventh but was an early visitor to the pit lane after picking up front wing damage after colliding with Oracle Red Bull Racing’s Sergio Pérez, with the German falling to the back of the pack as a result.

The safety car enabled him to catch up with the pack, and a pit stop for soft tyres enabled him to push forward and finish the race fourteenth, which became thirteenth after a time penalty was applied to Lance Stroll.

Steiner, the Team Principal at Haas, says the team did not have the pace to be a contender for points at Silverstone, and everyone at the team will be working hard to understand why and come back with a stronger performance in Hungary in two weeks time.

“It’s been a very disappointing weekend,” said Steiner.  “We just didn’t have the pace and we’ve now had our third engine failure in three races as well – that doesn’t help us.

“We have to regroup and see how we move forward from here because we need to get out of this hole. Everybody will be working on it obviously, but today was simply not a good day.”

Haas slipped to eighth in the Constructors’ Championship after the British Grand Prix thanks to Williams Racing’s Alexander Albon scoring an eighth-place finish.  They have scored eleven points in the opening ten races, and are ahead only of Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake and Scuderia AlphaTauri in the standings.

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