Steiner ’not optimistic’ for Baku

Haas boss Gunther Steiner says he is "not so optimistic" for Baku.

In the last races, the American team has made it into Q3 with an obviously fast car, only to slump to almost the slowest in the field in the race.

"We can clearly see in the data where we are wrong, and we have brought some new parts here," Steiner told Ekstra Bladet.

"But I don’t think we’ve solved the problem. Hopefully it gets a little better. To be honest, I’m not so optimistic about the race.

"I still think we will have a hard time keeping the tyres under optimal working conditions," he added.

In fact, Steiner thinks Baku could be Haas’ worst outing yet.

"It’s more about getting a better understanding for the rest of the season," he said. "Here we can only try to limit the damage.

"Baku is the worst track of all when it comes to keeping temperatures up."

Romain Grosjean agrees that, for Haas, Baku will be all about the tyres.

"We’re going to talk about tyres all weekend, and that applies to other teams too," he said. "Unfortunately.

"I wish formula one was simpler in that regard so we could play around with other settings."

Mercedes’ five time world champion Lewis Hamilton agrees.

"The tyres seem more complicated this year," he said.

"At the beginning of the season, everyone is struggling to understand the different working windows, and they seem even narrower than they were before."