More practice will cure pit stop woe – Steiner

Haas team principal Guenther Steiner says the key cure to its pit stop nightmare in Australia will be extra practice in preparation to bounce back at the Bahrain Grand Prix.

The US team endured a hellish 2018 F1 opener having seen both Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean forced out while running inside the top five and into retirements caused by cross-threaded wheel nuts during pit stops at the Australian race.

While the whole Haas team looked visibly hit by the pit stop blunders, with both drivers consoling the mechanics in Melbourne and on social media, Steiner says the only way to get over the problem will be extra practice at the next race in Bahrain.

“As a team, we made mistakes,” Steiner said. “We had too much work to do on the car and didn’t practice enough. I think the key to all of this is to get the practice in before the race so that we’re prepared for all aspects of the race.

“Last year, in the second half of the season we had some of the best pit stops on pit lane. We can do it. I think the lack of practice produced the result in Australia. Nevertheless, stuff like this happens. You get over it and move on.”

Steiner sees the Bahrain GP as the ideal opportunity to end the memories and comments about the pit stop mistakes with two strong results to make up for the lost points from Australia.

“I think if we achieve a good result in Bahrain, we will forget about Melbourne,” he said. “If we don’t, we’ll dwell over what happened in Australia until the time we have a fantastic result, or time gets us over it. The aim is to do everything right and come home with a good result.”