Haas team principal Guenther Steiner has revealed that himself and former driver Mick Schumacher “didn’t speak” when the Haas boss “said hello” to the axed driver, something he labels as a “good thing”.
Steiner has recently been accused of bullying the young German, following the release of the most recent season of Netflix’s docuseries ‘Drive to Survive’.
During the recent series, Steiner is shown telling Haas owner Gene Haas that Schumacher is a “dead man walking”, with the German having crashed his car heavily, twice, costing the team millions.
The Italian-American also said that you “can’t develop talent”, making it sound like the son of seven-time World Champion Michael Schumacher was treated as an experiment.
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Schumacher was ultimately told that his contract wouldn’t be extended beyond 2022 right at the end of the season, after every other seat had been filled on the grid.
Haas has been heavily criticised for this, with Schumacher on the bench at Mercedes as a result this season.
Bad blood clearly remains between the two, with a reunion certainly not likely to be on the cards.
“When I saw him, I said hello. We didn’t speak to each other,” Steiner told RTL.
“That’s a good thing. Because of the distance between us in the paddock now, we won’t always run into each other.”
Steiner has denied any accusations that he bullied the German, but admitted he can “understand” the driver’s fans’ frustrations.
The Haas boss admitted that some of his comments regarding Schumacher did occur “in the heat of the moment”, but that it “wasn’t bullying at all”.
“There was nothing out of the ordinary,” Steiner said.
“We don’t need to do any bullying, because after all he was our driver. But I can also absolutely understand Mick’s fans.
“In the heat of the moment you sometimes say something that you might say differently an hour later, but it wasn’t bullying at all.”
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Veteran Nico Hulkenberg was, of course, brought in to replace Schumacher, with Steiner having so far been very impressed by the former Renault driver’s honesty.
“I didn’t know him very well before, but well enough to say ‘I think he’s honest’. He doesn’t tell me the things I want to hear, but how they are,” Steiner added.
“Because everything is fine, I can’t help. I think we built that understanding pretty quickly,” Steiner said.