Kevin Magnussen believes Haas wasted their chances to achieve a strong result in last week’s Canadian Grand Prix after the Formula 1 team made a ‘disappointing’ mistake.
The American outfit failed to score any points in Montreal on Sunday as Nico Hulkenberg led Magnussen home in 11th and 12th. One point was within reach for Haas with Esteban Ocon of Alpine only half a second ahead. But a lot more appeared on the table over the early laps.
Qualifying was not a success for Haas at the Canadian GP with Magnussen only able to claim P14, with Hulkenberg also down in P19. Yet the wet conditions gave the team a chance to do something different by being the only outfit to start on the full wet tyres over intermediates.
Kevin Magnussen feels Haas made a mistake with his full wet tyres in the Canadian GP
Going against the grid seemed to be a great decision as Magnussen and Hulkenberg carved through the field. While their rivals fought for grip using Pirelli’s intermediate tyres, the Haas duo were sailing. Magnussen even ran as high as P4 before pitting as the track began to dry.
Haas opted to switch the 31-year-old onto intermediate tyres at the end of Lap 7 but elected to leave Hulkenberg on full wets. A slow pit stop also cost Magnussen another six seconds to drop out of the points as Haas were not prepared to service his car when the Dane stopped.
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Yet Magnussen feels Haas were wrong to stop him and should have left both of their cars on full wets. Hulkenberg did not stop until Lap 12 and the rest of the Formula 1 field made their first stops under the safety car Logan Sargeant caused by spinning in his Williams at Turn 4.
Haas also serviced Magnussen and Hulkenberg for a second time under the safety car to run in P15 and P18 respectively. The two stops negated all of the good work Magnussen enjoyed in the early laps and left the Haas racer regretting what could have been in the Canadian GP.
“I didn’t have the feeling that we got the best out of the race,” Magnussen said, via quotes by Speedweek. “We didn’t use the many opportunities that were presented to us.
“That’s disappointing. I think we came into the pits too early from the rain tyres. It felt like something was coming at the start of the race but, in the end, it didn’t.”
Haas will feel they made the right choice pitting to remove the full wet tyres
Magnussen ultimately finished the Canadian GP behind Hulkenberg as Haas pitted the Dane one more time than his teammate. Yet they crossed the line just 0.429 seconds apart as the German missed out on another points-scoring finish by 0.511 seconds to Alpine racer Ocon.
Yet even if Haas elected against stopping Magnussen and Hulkenberg before the first safety car, neither driver’s results may have improved. The rate the track dried made removing the full wet Pirelli tyres an easy decision for the team as their drivers would have still lost places.
Magnussen might feel he could have run longer on the full wets but Haas pitted Hulkenberg as soon as he started to lose places. The problem for Magnussen was that he then could not recover any of the other places the pit stop lost him once running on the intermediate tyres.
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