Haas Team Principal Guenther Steiner insists he has no regrets over its failed review of the United States Grand Prix as it highlighted the FIA’s “bad job” on track limits.
The American outfit had lodged a right of review request to the FIA to investigate the 56-lap race at the Circuit of the Americas amid the team’s discovery that several drivers had regularly exceeded track limits at Turn 6 but gone unpunished by the stewards.
However, in an online hearing, the United States GP stewards said that Haas failed to present a “significant and relevant new element” that wasn’t available at the time.
Despite rejecting Haas’ petition, the four-person panel noted the FIA must implement a better solution to avoid a repeat of the exploitation of track limits from Austin.
At the time, Haas asserted the team had appealed in the interest of consistency. Steiner has reiterated that stance, admitting satisfaction at the stewards’ admission.
“I don’t regret it,” Steiner said ahead of last weekend’s Las Vegas Grand Prix. “Obviously we were conscious that it will be difficult to make it stick but at least we tried.
“What came out is that the stewards actually said to the FIA that it’s doing a bad job. And I think that’s what was done. We didn’t get anything out of it but you have to try in life, you have to fight.”
Although he was pleased with the outcome in one regard, Steiner still criticised the stewards for deciding against advancing to the second stage of the review process.
“A fair hearing would be that they would accept the right to review and to review it properly, but obviously they didn’t want to go there for obvious reasons,” he remarked. “And that’s it, end of story.
“But as long as we move forward and get better for the future, it’s already a win [for us].”
The FIA conceded the CCTV and monitoring infrastructure in place at COTA was insufficient to police track limits, preventing punishments from being handed out.
Steiner outlines that the relevant framework must be established at each venue to ensure track limits are governed appropriately by the FIA at the time and not the teams on review.
“What they should have done is make sure that they had a CCTV camera on turn six so I don’t have to protest,” Steiner explained. “That is number one.
“They should make sure that they’ve got the means in place to check their own regulations, not me sitting at home or Aston Martin checking what they are doing. That is not the team’s job.
“In half an hour, we don’t have time to go through all that stuff because that is not our job. We are not the governing body, we are a race team, we pay somebody to do this job: the FIA.”
Having alluded to Aston Martin’s post-race protest in Austria, Steiner believes “everybody agreed” with Haas’ appeal but not many attempt to discuss the matter.
“I think that’s [the review] worth it for the whole of Formula 1, not only for us, because everybody agreed with it, but nobody did anything about it,” he argued.
