INTERVIEW: Is there a light at the end of the tunnel for Haas F1?

“Oh, it’s tough. I mean, if you do this because you compete, weekends like the one we had are tough, but it’s just part of it. You have to think about the big picture, otherwise you cannot motivate yourself. “

Haas team boss Günther Steiner has experienced difficult times in his Formula 1 career, including in his current position. But the Haas F1 history has been one of ups and downs, and even the tough seasons have occasionally seen promising prospects.

But the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a complete reset. The team just focused on surviving, doing the bare bones on their car, and signing newbies for 2021. The next step was to let these rookies gain experience while accepting that the team would be the slowest this season, with all development resources focused on the next new regulations of the year.

As Steiner ponders the season so far, he admits he’s ready to get closer in 2022 as every race weekend is tough for team members.

“I’m sure we’ll be in a better place next year, and they’ll probably have to get through this year to be in a better place,” Steiner told RACER. “Nothing is free and you have to fight for every little bit. And it wasn’t unexpected, but when you hit it it’s still hard.

“When reality strikes, it’s still hard to live with. But you always have to do your best because all guys do their best. You work hard and you have to try to get all that is there and whatever is there, you have to learn from it. “

You probably won’t be surprised to hear Steiner’s tough love approach at Haas. Rather than glossing over the situation the team is in, he has been brutally honest and continues to do so behind the scenes as he takes on his biggest job of keeping morale high when there are so few weekend points scoring opportunities .

“I’m not the type to go down and make a toast and say things that aren’t true,” he says. “The team has to believe in it and I think they do. Why else would they do it? And sometimes you just try to keep the momentum going and hope you have a good result in you – however small the good result may be. A good result at the moment … The entry into Q2 was the highlight of the first half of the season. But that’s why they do it.

“When Mick (Schumacher) had an accident in FP3 in Hungary, for example, the guys tried to get the car out. We don’t give up to qualify; they don’t give up and go ‘whatever’. No, let’s try to get out there and get the last out of it. And that keeps the team motivated.

Haas came into 2021 expecting a tough ride, but Steiner admits that this doesn’t make the reality of a difficult season any easier. Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

“And I know it’s hard work, but going out there and telling them a damn story … it doesn’t work. You know I won’t do that. So folks, we have to believe in ourselves. We can do it, we just need a better car. We know why we don’t have a good car – because we didn’t develop it last year. It is no secret. So we have to hold on to our faith. “

Repairing a damaged car was an event Steiner admits to be a little too frequent for his liking this year, although he gave both Schumacher and Nikita Mazepin some leeway to make mistakes. And these comments come about because the crashes have a direct impact on how much money Haas will have to spend on its 2022 project: The funds for replacing parts come from the budget for the next season.

“Absolutely (it hits next year’s budget),” says Steiner. “The thing is, we’re not at the budget ceiling, so we don’t feel it there, we feel it in the budget, basically in the cash register.

“It’s like everything else. When you buy a new car, you can’t go to the best restaurants every weekend. You need to think about where you are spending your money. At the moment we have to keep racing, so we just have to readjust everything a bit and move forward, just manage. “

Even so, Steiner is happy with the team’s budget for 2022 thanks to Russian investments and other partners added earlier this year, but he says it is still a little painful to have to spend part of it on repairs instead of the annual car.

“I’m very happy, but building a good budget doesn’t mean you want to spend it on things that don’t make things better,” he says. “I always see spending budget as an investment – doing something with it that will make you better in the future.”

Part of this investment has strengthened Ferrari’s partnership with a bespoke facility in Maranello that will only be used by staff seconded to Haas. Headed by Simone Resta, Steiner says the new base is 90% complete and working well, with work on the new car moving forward.

When the Haas team boss searches for light at the end of the tunnel, he thinks about how the team prepared for its debut in 2016 and can now measure progress with it.

“We see the advantage that we can fully concentrate on the new regulations,” he says. “We’ve done this before, so I have something to compare with. We did it in ’14 and ’15 when we didn’t have a car. So I see good signs and Simone is doing a good job bringing a team back together in Italy.

“That’s why I’m cautiously optimistic that we’ll be back next year. We may not be back like we were in ’18 – I don’t know, I hope we will – but even if you’re not there, at least if you can fight for points like we’ve done every year other than this one one thing, that would be a success in my opinion. “

There is still a lot of racing to come in 2021, but only four months until Haas can leave the last two seasons behind and steer all his motivation into a hopefully better future.