Haas gearbox issue at Imola gave Magnussen 'massive headache'

A gearbox issue literally went to Kevin Magnussen's head in the Emilia Romagna GP, inflicting the Haas driver with a massive headache that led to his retirement.

Haas identified a gearbox issue on Magnussen's car in qualifying but opted not to replace the element for Sunday's race to spare its driver a grid penalty.

From 17th on the grid, Magnusson jockeyed for position at the start, but rounding the left-hander of Tosa the Haas was pitched into a spin by Sebastian Vettel's Ferrari, a contact that dropped the Dane down the field.

Magnussen battled his way into the top ten thanks to a long 26-lap first stint on the medium tyre. But the gearbox gremlins from the previous day had reappeared and unsettled the Haas driver, inducing a splitting headache that proved too painful to endure.

"The problem came back in the race, it was there from the first lap," Magnussen explained.

"I was having slow up-shifts, and not only are they slow, it’s also like a big bang every time you up-shift.

"It seems okay for a couple of laps but then it starts shaking your head crazily. By the end I just had a massive headache – I told the team."

• F1i's Driver Ratings for the 2020 Emilia Romagna GP

Asked by his engineer if he wanted to pit, a brave Magnussen replied: "It's my job…" But eventually, his team decided to put him out of his misery.

"I think they felt there was nothing to fight for, so they [pitted] me," he said ."I was spun around at the start and that was really the end of it. I lost so much time getting back on track.

"The pace was really good actually, it was better than we had expected – even with the up-shifts that were costing us around half a second a lap."

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