Haas’ Guenther Steiner was left surprised after another tangle between Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen in F1 German GP despite the talks.
Following the disaster in F1 British GP for the two Haas drivers, Steiner stepped in to sort out the differences and explain Grosjean and Magnussen to not hit each other in grand prix races which not only causes an embarrassment but derails the progress of a team.
The two drivers already had a history of coming together in 2019 F1 season, with a big example of it in the Spanish GP. It all good fine at Hockenheim in F1 German GP until the end stages when the two were jostling for track positions in treacherous conditions.
Grosjean got ahead of Magnussen at one point with the Alfa Romeo Racing cars in the mix but the Dane tried to fight back in the hairpin, where they touched, leading to some heat of the moment radio calls, as Magnussen asked: “What is he doing?”
And Grosjean then: “My God! This guy is incredible, he will never learn.” Post-race though, Magnussen was sent congratulatory messages as they celebrated the double points. While they celebrated the double points finish, Steiner was left surprised with the latest hit.
The Italian said that he will again speak with the drivers ahead of the Hungarian GP this weekend and if need be, explain the drivers how to drive lap by lap. “I am also surprised as everybody else that after what happened in Silverstone, they do it again,” said Steiner.
“I’ll speak with them before Budapest and find a clear ‘what to do and what not to do’ if they cannot understand what it means. I have to tell them event by event, lap by lap, to what to do. We have come to a conclusion as we are not quick really, I would say.
“We don’t need anymore distractions or loss of points by running into each other or anybody else as well. We will regroup and go again. Our pace again in the race wasn’t good, we finished in points because a lot of people retired and not on merit.
“We fully are aware about it and not standing here saying that everything is fantastic. I have never seen something like this that we are so far ahead in qualifying and go down so much in the race, so we can only push and work in this situation and try to find out why.”
They eventually gained more points after the time penalties to the Alfa Romeo drivers, with Grosjean ending up seventh and Magnussen eighth, which helped them to have 26 points – same as Alfa Romeo – to be eighth after 11 races. The result stands provisional though.
The drivers though chose not to speak much about the incident, as they concentrated on the battles and the points finish. “I’m very happy with the double points finish,” said Grosjean. “It was obviously a bit of a crazy race.
“I don’t think we’ve quite sorted our race pace. When you see the midfield being in front of us and only the Williams behind. Anyway, we survived when we had to survive, but it was very difficult. You saw all the top guys going out and off the track – conditions were very tricky.
“I’m happy to have a double points finish, but when you see a Toro Rosso on the podium, you wish you were there. With all the experience we have, we should be able. It’s just that the race pace on inters and slicks wasn’t good enough.”
Meanwhile, Magnussen added: “It was a very crazy race. It was entertaining and exciting all the way through. There are always hard decisions to make with all the changing weather, having to decide the tires and so on.
“The way we earned the point was to be good on the dry tyre in the mixed conditions. That’s when we made up on the opposition. In the dry we didn’t have any pace, so we fell back. At least we got both cars in the points, I don’t think we could have done that in the dry.”
Here’s how the terrific German GP panned out
Alfa Romeo drivers out of points, Lewis Hamilton & Robert Kubica in
Charles Leclerc, Nico Hulkenberg not really happy with dragster tarmac