Guenther Steiner believes to score points in 2017 is extremely difficult due to the closeness of the midfield, so for his Haas F1 Team to have done it in five races is positive for the youngest team on the grid.
Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen have scored fifteen points in the opening seven races, much to the delight of Team Principal Steiner, and he believes the team will only get better as they continue maturing.
“We’ve had our ups and downs, but we scored points in five of the seven races,” said Steiner. “And in one of those races, we were well on our way to score points, but then we had a mechanical failure.
“The midfield is very tough, and to score points five out of seven times is not bad. Sure, we need to score more points, not just one-point scores, but in general the team is maturing and I’m very confident that we’ll keep maturing.”
Steiner is unsure of where Haas’ pace will be this weekend in Azerbaijan, and only when running gets underway on Friday will they truly know if they are in the hunt for a points finish.
“Like all the circuits, we have to see where our time will be,” said Steiner. “The times improve more on a slower circuit with the new car than on the fast circuits because the top speeds are not much higher than last year.
“So, I don’t know how the surface looks this year in Baku. Last year it was pretty slippery, and I don’t know if the asphalt is still slippery. We’ll really only know until after FP1.
“You can use all the data again because now, having done seven races, we can translate the data from last year’s car to this year’s car pretty easily. It all helps, and we’re able to come in to this race as well prepared as we can.”
