Haas boss Guenther Steiner has confirmed his team have no spare chassis for this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix, following Mick Schumacher’ s horror crash in Saudi Arabia. Schumacher’s car was left in ruins, following the shocking accident around the Jeddah track in qualifying.
The driver was air-lifted to hospital, whilst the wreckage of his car was removed from the track. Fortunately Schumacher was later given the all-clear and was released from hospital, however the same couldn’t be said for his car.
As a result Steiner estimated that the cost of the repair would set the team back £760,000 ($1 million), due to the sheer damage of the car. And, despite the full fix the American-based team are still suffering the consequences of the Saudi crash down under this week.
This comes after the team principal confirmed the chassis that was damaged in the crash will have to be used as the spare in Australia. He told reporters at Albert Park: "We have everything, but we have no abundance of spare parts.
"The next question is how is the spare chassis? We haven’t got one because we have sent it back to Europe at the beginning of the week, so we’ll get it ready for Imola. We had to bring it here because of customs formalities. It had to enter here and then it could be shipped back to Europe from here, and it’s on its way back now."
Despite the setback Steiner is still remaining positive ahead of the race, and believes the part shortage causes no need to panic. He added: "I think we cannot approach [the situation] differently. The drivers are aware of the situation, that there is no spare chassis, but that can happen sometimes.
"I’m not panicking and if something happens, we will deal with it as it comes along. You cannot say ‘go out there and drive slowly’, that doesn’t make sense as well, just like: ‘don’t take extra risks if you don’t have to’.”
It has no doubt been a difficult couple of years for the American-based team, especially after finishing point-less and bottom of the constructor standings in 2021. In spite of this the team boss spoke positively about his Haas’ journey so far in Formula 1, and is eyeing improved success in the future.
Steiner said: "It’s been a very good ride, there’s been some challenges in the ride, but it’s been fantastic. The most memorable moment for sure was the sixth-place finish in our first race, and second, the fifth-place finish in the championship in 2018, which we will try to replicate hopefully soon."
