F1 News, Reports and Race Results

Grosjean 'sorry' for raising doubts about Haas

Romain Grosjean has apologised for making comments calling into question the Haas F1 Team's long-term commitment to remaining in the sport.

In the build-up to Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix, Grosjean was asked about his chances of staying with the team beyond the end of the current season.

He replied by talking about "the elephant in the room", which he said was the question of whether Haas itself would still be in F1 in 2021.

That caused consternation within the Haas camp where the matter of the team's long term future is unsurprisingly a highly sensitive issue.

Team principal Guenther Steiner made his displeasure with the Frenchman's comments clear over the weekend, stating that Grosjean's answer "was the wrong answer" in the circumstances.

And now Grosjean has apologised for his original remarks and walked back his original comments about the team's prospects.

“I’m sorry if I said anything wrong,” he told Motorsport.com after the race. “I said something that I shouldn’t have said.

“I didn’t want to create anything," he added. "You know I’m sorry for the team. And all good.”

He added that the internal drama surrounding his original comments wasn't going to end up as one of the centre pieces in the next series of Netflix's Drive to Survive behind-the-scenes documentary series.

"There’s no Netflix episodes, there is no problem," he insisted.

For his part, Steiner said he had been amazed when he had first heard about Grosjean's "elephant in the room" comments but added that he had never actually been angry about them.

©Haas

"I was never upset about it,” he said. “You know me, I react to something and I get over things pretty quick.

"I’m not upset, it was just like - I was amazed when I read it, because I wasn’t there obviously," he added. “So I asked, but I’m fine with him. I have no problem.

“I think he realised [that] it was a tough question and he answered in a way, maybe, after thinking he didn’t want to answer. He didn’t maybe mean what he said, you know. I have no problem.

"If I get anybody mad if I say something not appropriate, I would have everybody mad at me! But I get over things pretty quick."

Steiner was also feeling more upbeat after the race in which Kevin Magnussen scored the team's first championship point of the season thanks to the decision to call in its drivers for a change of tyres before the start - even though they subsequently incurred a penalty in so doing.

“It was a great result for the team," he said. "It’s fantastic, as at the moment we’re not in a position to do this under normal circumstances. The call at the beginning of the race was the decision which made this happen, the guys then just kept it up.

"Kevin did a fantastic job in the race, Romain just had a few issues with the tires. Thanks to the whole team for putting in the hard work and keeping on pushing – they never gave up; we never give up."

Gallery: The beautiful wives and girlfriends of F1 drivers

Keep up to date with all the F1 news via Facebook and Twitter

Haas F1 Team, Guenther Steiner, Roman Grosjean

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.

Recent Posts

Williams' headaches persist into Vegas practice

Williams is continuing to fight uphill battles this weekend in Las Vegas as a knock-on…

21 mins ago

Ferrari's Sainz 'not satisfied with where we are' in Vegas

It was a solid start to the Las Vegas weekend for Ferrari with Carlos Sainz…

2 hours ago

Norris labels McLaren long-run pace ‘shocking’ in chilly Vegas

Lando Norris didn’t hold back in his assessment of McLaren’s performance on the opening day…

3 hours ago

Hamilton delighted with ‘consistently strong day’ in Vegas

Lewis Hamilton was particularly happy with his opening day of running at the Las Vegas…

4 hours ago

Verstappen stuck with 'draggy' rear wing for Vegas

Red Bull fears that its prospects for this weekend's Las Vegas Grand Prix - which…

5 hours ago

Ferrari and Mercedes admit to plank changes based on FIA’s TD

Ferrari and Mercedes have both modified their car’s floor element in Las Vegas to comply…

6 hours ago