Haas’ Kevin Magnussen has said he will try to stay away from McLaren’s Fernando Alonso as much as possible on track following their latest run-in.
The Dane and the Spaniard came together in Q2 of Italian GP ruining each others lap, more so for Magnussen who had the chance to get into Q3 like Haas teammate Romain Grosjean. His race was then compromised after a run-in with Sergio Perez.
Post qualifying at Monza, Magnussen lashed out on the two-time Formula 1 world champion stating that Alonso thinks himself as a ‘God-like’ figure in the sport and that he cannot wait for him to retire. The Spaniard did not wish to respond.
Their team bosses, Haas’ Guenther Steiner and McLaren’s Zak Brown were also at odds with each other but Brown joked that the two can still have a beer together later on, not so much their drivers though.
When asked Magnussen in the lead up to Singapore GP, the Dane said he would not like to run into Alonso in the qualifying or the races in the future. “I’ll try to stay away from Fernando as much as I can.
“I think it was a pretty extraordinary thing that happened and it’s not something that will happen too often I think.” The Dane is on a roll in his second season with Haas as it sits eighth in the standings with 49 points.
Magnussen was behind Alonso in the initial stages of 2018 but has since passed him in the chase of Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg, who has 52 points to his name in the fight for the best of the rest honours.
“I think the team has done an amazing job to get the consistency that we’ve had this year compared to last year where we had a strong car at a few races, but not a lot of consistency,” he said on Haas.
“For a team in its third year, I think it’s pretty impressive to make such quick progress. We’re doing everything we can to get the results and to deliver as well as we can. I think we’ve done a good job to be that close to Renault in the championship for fourth.
“Especially when you consider the bad luck and some of the problems we’ve had at a few races this year. It shows that we’ve got a really good car and that there’s potential for more.”
The team, in fact, tied on points with Renault after Italian GP but with the protest by the French manufacturer over its illegal floor led to Grosjean’s disqualification, dropping Haas to fifth again with 76 points as Renault is fourth with 86.
The team has officially protested over the call from the FIA with the hearing set to take place in November. Team principal Steiner believes the outfit has a good case but labelled it as 50-50 chance for now.