Steiner mode activated after Haas woes

Woefully off the pace in France and failing to score for the second race in a row, Guenther Steiner says the Paul Ricard weekend was Haas’ “worst since we started the team.”

Neither Kevin Magnussen nor Romain Grosjean had any pace during the French GP weekend with the Dane starting P15 on the grid to Grosjean’s 16th.

The story continued in Sunday’s 53-lap race with Magnussen falling two places while Grosjean eventually retired with just a handful laps remaining.

And Haas’ team boss almost launched full Steiner mode (no swearing) trying to come to terms with Haas’ problems.

“In the four-year history I think this was our worst weekend all in all,” Steiner said.

“In the race we still struggled. I don’t know why. What is bizarre to me is that a car that was good enough to qualify seventh and eighth in the first race and then sixth in Monte Carlo, all of a sudden we are second last.

“Don’t ask me what it is, I don’t know. So don’t even ask me, please, because I couldn’t answer it. We need to find out and it’s very disappointing to be honest, ending up in this situation but not having an understanding of it is the worst of all.

“This was a lot worse than Montreal, because already on Friday and in qualifying we weren’t good. At least in Montreal in qualifying we got one car into Q3, but here we were happy to get one car out of Q1. So that was a lot worse.

“Then if you think in Monte Carlo we qualified sixth. Then the race pace is difficult to say in Monte Carlo because everyone was going slow for obvious reasons, but the race pace was there. So it’s very bizarre, the whole thing.”

However, Steiner vowed that he and the team would not give up trying to get to the bottom of the issues affecting them.

“It’s not depressing,” he added.

“I’m realistic. I’m not getting depressed. I’m getting… angry is the wrong word. For me, it’s a challenge, but it’s not a positive challenge. We need to get out of this. If we get depressed you give up. We never give up. In racing, the day you give up you stay where you are. You need to get the anger out and just keep on working.

“That’s what I told the guys. I said, ‘Guys, you need to work a lot more now than you did before. There’s no point waiting for something to come, you need to go back now and understand why we are where we are. That’s the only thing you can do.

“Once you know why you are where you are, then you can find solutions. If you don’t know that one, how can you work on solutions? Then you work on everything and then you make a new car.”

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