Guenther Steiner believes it would not be logical for the Bahrain International Circuit to hold one of the pre-season tests, despite the significant amount of lost track time during last weeks first test of 2018 at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.
The team principal of the Haas F1 Team says teams are constantly developing their cars pre-season and introducing new parts, which would take considerable more time and cost considerably more to bring to Bahrain than to Spain, and the costs involved would not be sustainable for a team like Haas.
Steiner hopes for better weather for test two, but despite the significant amount of lost track time last week, particularly on Wednesday when snow and rain prevented his driver Romain Grosjean from taking to the track at all, it still would not be good for one of the pre-season tests to be taken outside of Europe.
“The thing is if next week you have a good week, normal temperature, 16-17ºC, sunshine, we would have forgotten until we decide again where we go next year,” said Steiner on Crash.
“But the cost is one of the elements going to Bahrain. It’s not easy, but also the logistics if you need something. For example the first year when we came in here two years ago it was talked about going to Bahrain or Abu Dhabi and that would be a no-no because if you are new and you need to fly something somewhere.
“You guys have no idea how much stuff is coming here every day. Every day there is stuff coming for the car, it’s brutal.
“From England or from Italy you just put it in a van, they drive and eight hours later they are here. From England it’s 12 or 14, whatever it is, but you can put it on a plane as hand luggage. We have got people going up and down every day.
“If it is Bahrain, you need to get prepared. It’s the same for everybody and we’d need to get better prepared, but that’s one of the issues. Then the next thing is some teams would put on a jet every night to go back and forward – and some cannot.”
