‘Embarrassed’ Steiner did not Expect a Rookie to Crash like Grosjean

During the Azerbaijan GP, Romain Grosjean crashed out while behind the safety car. In all honesty, it had to be one of the most embarrassing moments for the Frenchman. Team principal Guenther Steiner admitted that one wouldn’t expect such a crash from a rookie. And that makes things all the more humiliating for the 32-year old.

Grosjean discarded a sure-fire points-scoring result last Sunday as he spun out while warming his tires behind the Safety Car.

He said that he accidentally “bumped” a switch as he was warming his tyres and that caused him to spin out of control.

Unfortunately, Steiner isn’t convinced by the weak explanation. He said: “You don’t expect from a rookie or anybody.

“I think we are not using the potential of the car to get in the points. We should be quite well up there because the car is performing very well.

“In the race we saw we started last and were P8 with Romain behind Perez.

“That was on speed because everybody had one stop so there was nothing.

“Sure the Safety Car comes out and we are in P6 all of a sudden but then we go home with nothing.”

Grosjean’s DNF means that Haas have amassed just 11 points in four grand prix weekends. Steiner admitted that there were times where the points were slipping from their grasp.

“You’ve just got to tell people that you haven’t done anything wrong. It’s not your fault that Romain went in the wall, we did a good job, we did good pit stops, we prepared the car well.

“The whole weekend, until qualifying started, was very well executed, we had no down time with the car and we did a lot of good things. The guys know themselves if they are good or not.