After Haas F1 Team’s great start to the season, they appeared to struggle at the new look Albert Park Circuit, as both Kevin Magnussen and Mick Schumacher finished low in the standings for Free Practice One and Free Practice Two on the opening day of the returning Australian Grand Prix.
Coming into the opening session, Magnussen was not feeling too well after suffering from nausea in the night. The Dane completed eighteen laps with his best time of a 1:23.186, putting him only in eighteenth place after the first session.
Mick Schumacher on the other hand was coming into Free Practice One after the horrifying crash that he suffered in qualifying at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. Schumacher completed only fifthteen laps with his best time of a 1:24.349, leaving him at the bottom of the order after the first session.
Haas F1 Team did improve in Free Practice Two but will still feel a little disappointed, as they head into Saturday. Magnussen completed twenty-three laps with his best overall time of a 1:21.191, putting him in sixteenth position. Schumacher also moved up two positions like his team-mate in Free Practice Two, as he completed twenty-two laps with his best lap-time of a 1:21.974, leaving him in eighteenth position.
Haas Team Principal, Guenther Steiner, reflected on a difficult day for the team but remained positive heading into Saturday.
“Not a perfect day for us today with various issues but FP2 was already better than FP1, so we just need to work a little bit more. The team is trying hard for FP3 to get to the next step and then we’ll be where we want to be. There were a few things, starting with Kevin not feeling very well this morning, and then maybe some suspension problem which we couldn’t fix for Mick which we’ll now try to investigate. There was a little bit of everything – not a perfect day but we’ll come back tomorrow.”
