No one person to blame says Steiner after Haas drivers clash again

2021 Dutch Grand Prix

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Haas team principal Guenther Steiner says the team will hold discussions over the latest run-in between its two drivers during the Dutch Grand Prix.

However, he said he does not consider either Nikita Mazepin or Mick Schumacher wholly to blame for the deteriorating relationship between the pair.

Mazepin was furious after Schumacher overtook him at the beginning of their final runs during qualifying yesterday, which he believes went against an internal team arrangement. He closed the door sharply on Schumacher early in today’s race, leaving him with front wing damage.

Steiner said played down the contact between the pair, which forced Schumacher to make an early pit stop. “I don’t think it was a nasty move to be honest,” he said. “I looked at the scenario and it takes always two to tango.”

He spoke to the pair following the race and said there will be further discussions ahead of the next grand prix.

“I would say there is not one to be blamed on this,” said Steiner. “We need to work on it, be constructive.

“We had a meeting after our engineering debrief about it. We haven’t come to a conclusion. The plan is to meet before Monza and to see what we need to do to avoid this in future because it doesn’t help anybody, I tried to explain that one. So we will work on it and we will work on it until we get it sorted.”

Steiner indicated the next step could be to impose formal rules of engagement between his two drivers. “It’s not easy to bang their heads together, but you have to come to some conclusions,” he said. “Otherwise, we need to put rules in place.”

Schumacher believes Mazepin’s displeasure at the events of qualifying yesterday was the reason for his hard defensive move during today’s race.

“We didn’t chat much today but I think that from his point of view I think you saw what he still thinks about it and about the whole situation, because I think otherwise you don’t react the way he did in this race today,” he said.

He admitted he hasn’t experienced such a hostile situation with any of his team mates previously.

“This is quite new to me,” he said. “I feel like normally if you talk about it, you have a certain respect then. I feel that it’s quite difficult to find that at the moment for some reason, I don’t really understand. But that hopefully we’ll manage to solve it.”

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2021 Dutch Grand Prix

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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17 comments on “No one person to blame says Steiner after Haas drivers clash again”

  1. “This is quite new to me,” he said. “I feel like normally if you talk about it, you have a certain respect then. I feel that it’s quite difficult to find that at the moment for some reason, I don’t really understand. But that hopefully we’ll manage to solve it.”

    I love the playing the victim part. Neither driver is a saint one just has a better public image and appeal.
    Haas is almost proving itself to be a dysfunctional team with very poor intra team communications. Only recently do they warn their drivers of approaching leading cars both in qualifying and race. I wonder if they deliberately create these toxicity.

    1. I was just gonna comment something like that.. man Schumacher is canny LOL

    2. Interesting first bit of your post too; but

      Haas is almost proving itself to be a dysfunctional team with very poor intra team communications. Only recently do they warn their drivers of approaching leading cars both in qualifying and race. I wonder if they deliberately create these toxicity.

      definitely something I have to wonder too.

  2. Cmon Guenther. That was f’n dangerous. Like Ocon/Perez at Spa. Not cool.

  3. Yes (@come-on-kubica)
    5th September 2021, 19:10

    This is the most toxic partnership in f1 and they are fighting for 19th – gunther is going to smash more doors.

  4. Dutchguy (@justarandomdutchguy)
    5th September 2021, 19:13

    Both of these deserve a Foksmashing. They were just embarrasing themselves and the team.

  5. The defence by Mazzepin was aggressive but I don’t think it was too bad.

    It wasn’t noted or investigated by the stewards & on on the Sky commentary Jenson Button didn’t seem too upset with it either when the replay was shown.

    1. Back in the days when guys like Senna & Mansell did stuff like that (And i’ve seen both be far more aggressive than this) it was called good, hard racing but to modern/younger fans it’s unacceptable because with DRS producing easy push of a button highway passes they sadly don’t know what real racing is. I feel for those fans who have never seen real racing on real circuits due to only having seen the gimmick-fest current F1 where real racing isn’t allowe anymored.

      1. Mazepin’s face would have been foksmashed if he drove in the Senna & Mansell days…
        Today’s move wasn’t good hard racing by any means, just go watch the episode…
        You don’t swerve like that in the middle of a straight while another guy is taking the inside line..

  6. I like that ‘foksmashed’ is now a term we all understand. I’m unsure whether to feel sorry for Gunther as he seems to have the hardest job in F1, or that he ends up in these situations through his own making.

    At least with Kmag and Romain he could threaten to get rid of them come season end, both Nikita and Mick know that their jobs aren’t really up to Gunther at the end of the day.

    1. “their jobs aren’t really up to Gunther ” sadly true. BTW, TV needs to keep a feed on these guys …. “entertainment”

  7. Haas should be relegated to F2.

    1. Haas’ livery is a total failure.

  8. Most wicked lineup in many times: one who wants to pose as a good boy and the other who’s widely regarded as the opposite. It has everyting it takes to not work unless in generating gossip headlines.

  9. Bring on Sochi!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  10. That move was extremely dangerous, but annoyingly, technically within the rules. Of more interest to me were the potential consequences if Schumacher had touched Mazepin’s rear tyres, which he very nearly did. He’d have taken off at 180mph and either landed on top of the pit wall, or headed into the pit entrance or end of the pit wall. It looked very much like that area was not properly protected with soft barriers, making it even more dangerous to hit than Interlagos’s pit wall end. The circuit owners must remedy this risk for next year’s race.

  11. Baku race, Zandvoort Q1 and race. I wouldn’t be surprised if more intra-team clashes are waiting.

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