Haas 'won't be one hit wonders', insists Steiner

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Haas F1 team principal Guenther Steiner is confident that the team have demonstrated that they are hear to stay.

The team wasn't able to reproduce the points finish in Melbourne that they managed in their maiden season. However, Steiner says they still did more than enough to justify their place in Formula 1.

"There was no big miracle in the race, but a small miracle in qualifying with finishing P6 behind the three frontrunner teams," Steiner told the official Formula 1 website this week. "That was also pretty cool!

"True, the first year is the first year. Your first race is your first race and will always be a special moment in the team’s history.

"This year it was a bit sad retiring from seventh position.

"But what we understand is that we can carry over the momentum from last year. We are not a 'one-year wonder', but a serious long-term race team.

"We have a good plan. In reality I think we are in the range of our midfield opponents in terms of quantity."

Steiner added that the need to keep that momentum going had been behind the tean's decision to let Esteban Gutierrez go at the end of 2016. He's been replaced by former McLaren and Renault driver Kevin Magnussen.

"Why that happened? Very simply, you try to improve," Steiner explained. "Esteban didn’t score any points last year. It was also important for us to see if it was the driver or us not delivering. That’s why we decided that we need a change.

"There are not too many drivers in the league of Kevin," he added. "We knew Kevin already, as we had spoken with him already the year before. So we talked again and it didn’t take long to come to an agreement.

Steiner: strategy a differentiator in mid-field battle

Both Magnussen and his team mate Romain Grosjean had checkered pasts in the sport, but that didn't trouble Steiner.

"Both had some troubles in the past, but difficulties make you better," Steiner said. "We never really investigated why they had to leave teams. We took them as individuals who would suit our mentality at a time when they were free and we wanted them.

"I think they fit pretty well into our team - maybe we are a bit troubled as well," he laughed. "There is the American saying: ‘What makes you suffer makes you tougher!'"

"We will have a substantial upgrade for Barcelona," he revealed. "The next step is still in the wind tunnel. Once we find the gains we will start producing. There is a good plan in place."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.