Haas should have scored more points than it did in 2018, team principal Guenther Steiner admitted, as the team was beaten to fourth place in the championship by Renault.
Formula 1’s youngest team ended its third season fifth in the championship, 29 points behind Renault. But Steiner acknowledged the VF-18 was capable of more.“We lost points which we shouldn’t have lost,” said Steiner. “But I don’t want to find excuses. I think it’s part of growing.
The team impressed in pre-season testing with the speed of its car, but both drivers failed to finish the first race of the season following errors in their pit stops. Steiner said the team’s struggles this year were symptomatic of their rapid ascent up the F1 order.
“The air is getting thinner higher up you get, we realise that one. It’s just part of our growing process going forward. If you are in that league you just need to make everything work to be there.
“It’s not enough to have just a good car, you need the full package. You need everything executed perfect.”
Steiner believes learning as they go is “the only way” for Haas to improve. “You cannot learn it or study it, you just need to to do it.
“We shouldn’t be doing it wrong but by doing it wrong you learn not to do it wrong any more. So to learn out of it and get better, that is my aim anyway, because I think if you do it wrong once it’s not OK but you can live with it.”
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2018 F1 season
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- Ricciardo: Baku “s***show” was Red Bull’s fault
ColdFly (@)
14th December 2018, 8:32
MrBoerns (@mrboerns)
14th December 2018, 9:45
Shouldn’t that say ‘Marcus lost us points we shouldn’t have lost’?
Joao (@johnmilk)
14th December 2018, 10:21
badum tss
Jere (@jerejj)
14th December 2018, 9:47
The loss of a potential points-haul of 22 or at the very least 18 (P5-P6) at the season-opening Australian GP probably had the most significant impact on the final score in the standings alongside, of course, all the other lost points due to errors and or decisions made.
anon
14th December 2018, 21:01
@jerejj, that alone was a major error, but throughout the season the team and their drivers wasted opportunities to score.
Baku was something of an example of that – Grosjean might have started 20th, but it looked like he was going to atone for that when he’d got up to 6th place. With Bottas retiring later on, Grosjean could have taken at least 5th place and might have had an outside chance of 4th place if he’d been close enough to profit from Vettel’s mistake when trying to pass Bottas – but, instead, it came to nothing with the crash that came in the worst of circumstances and made him look especially bad.
As for Magnussen, his overly aggressive defensive moves against Gasly were lucky not to cause a pretty major accident – as it was, he threw away any chance of scoring himself, almost certainly throwing away a few points at least in the process.
Between mistakes by the drivers and mistakes by the team, such as their disqualification in Italy, Haas really should have scored between 40-50 points more than they did – they should have been finishing about 20 points ahead of Renault, not closer to 30 points behind them. Without Force India having to start over again in the middle of the season, Haas probably would have finished in 6th place in the WCC – a real underperformance for a team that started the season with the 4th fastest car.
pastaman (@)
14th December 2018, 13:39
In other breaking news, the sun rose this morning and the sky is blue.
Todfod (@todfod)
14th December 2018, 14:18
When’s this guy going to stop moping and just get on with life?
Mr. Steiner.. you had rubbish drivers and rubbish execution. The only thing worked for you was a car designed by Ferrari and made by Dallarra.
Consider yourself fortunate you finished P5 and move on with your life.
Jimmi Cynic (@jimmi-cynic)
14th December 2018, 23:04
@todfod: Outside of friends and family and patriotic zealots, wonder what sort of fanbase haas Haas accumulated.
It’s tough for new teams without any F1 legacy to attract fans – constant moaning by team management and drivers is very unique approach to build a fanbase.
Covered in a dreary livery, driven by the romantic backstory of industrial machine tools maven meets global marketing platform with the least amount of bespoke components – Haas haas not captured my enthusiastic support.
Todfod (@todfod)
16th December 2018, 11:57
@jimmi-cynic
Underdogs and new teams have had my support in the past. I supported Marrussia, Minardi and even Caterham. It’s because I respected them for giving it a genuine shot against the big boys. They built their own cars (no matter how rubbish) and they tried punching above their weight. They didn’t last too long… But they had my respect.
Haas on the other hand have outsourced every possible function they could to someone else. They aren’t a serious racing team. The only reason they aren’t last on the grid is because Ferrari and Dallarra have done a good job for them.
Honestly, I don’t see how anyone can really be a fan of this ‘racing team’
MaliceCooper
14th December 2018, 15:44
I wonder if the 2019 Haas will look like a 2018 Ferrari with a snowplough strapped to the front
Jay Menon (@jaymenon10)
15th December 2018, 0:53
Haas is a young team and should be given credit for where they are just now. They’ve applied a model which works for them and there is no need to ashamed of it, because this is what they set out to do. Should they be doing better on the back of the pace of their car? Sure.
They will learn, race execution will become better with practise. One area they have to address is their driver situation. They don’t have a set of stable drivers. While quick, Grosjean is too erratic. There is a winner in there somewhere, but he doesn’t turn up often enough. KMag seemed a bit more consistent towards the end of the season, but he still has a bit of a mad streak in him. Essentially, both drivers and team did not extract the maximum out of their cars.
For a team like Haas, in the short term, they need to be consistently picking up points, hope for a lucky podium or 4th place every now and again. For that, they need a safe pair of hands that will deliver a steady performance. A Nick Heidfeld (who would be a contemporary equivalent?) type driver would be perfect for them.