Steiner: Mick Schumacher ‘In a Difficult Position’ With Mazepin at Haas

Mick Schumacher will soon be making his debut in Formula 1, and the expectations unsurprisingly have been soaring high. However, Haas’ boss, Guenther Steiner, opined that Mick could be looking forward to a rather difficult season in 2021.

Although he comes from a racing family, there is no guarantee that Mick can get over the season with ease. Moreover, he will have another rookie driver as his teammate. Hence, the young German will have no experienced driver alongside him to learn from.

Steiner on Mick Schumacher racing alongside another rookie

Writing in his column for The Race, Steiner opened up on why Mick might not be having an easy rookie season.

“He’s a very pleasant guy. Very well prepared technically,” he said. “The guys like him and his feedback, and he has no problem to admit the things where he needs to get better.

“That is what we need to do, make him go better because everything is new. He’s been put in a difficult position because his teammate is another rookie. But he knew that from the get-go.”

Prior to the Haas signing, Mick was in talks with Alfa Romeo, and it looked like he might line up alongside Kimi Raikkonen. The Finn would have been the perfect teammate for a young driver like Mick.

And with the abundant experience that Kimi brings to the fold, it is pretty obvious that Mick would have grown to become a better driver in no time.

However, unfortunately, the doors slammed shut for Mick in Alfa Romeo, and all he had was Haas, which he eventually opted for.

It was very good to have him: Steiner

The Haas’ boss pointed at Mick’s professionalism as his biggest positive going into 2021. Steiner felt that it had everything to do with his family background.

“He’s very professional. You can see he grew up in a family that knows what racing is all about,” he said. “It was very good to have him around, and I look forward to having these new challenges in front of me.”

Looking at what to expect from the young German over his rookie season, the answer would be ‘not much’. Of course, he just won an F2 title, but it would be unfair to expect similar domination from Mick in F1, especially while driving for a struggling team like Haas.

However, it is definitely going to be a juicy teammate battle between Mick and controversy-laden Nikita Mazepin. The fact that the two are hard racers can open the door to interesting wheel-to-wheel battles.

Overall, such predictions point out to just one question, which is, who is going to win that crucial rookie battle?