Gone are the days when it was believed that Formula 1 was an excellent dish of European motorsport cuisine, so the American public, with its much simpler preferences, is not very interested in it. Three Grand Prix have already taken place in the USA and this weekend the stands at the Austin circuit are expected to be sold out again.
The story about Andretti Cadillac’s possible entry into the championship is far from finalized, and Haas F1 remains the only world championship team with American ownership and formally registered abroad, even though the cars are built in Europe.
But Haas views the US Grand Prix as a very important stage, and the introduction of a host of technical innovations was specifically timed for the Texas weekend. On the one hand, this gives an extra opportunity to excel in the home phase, on the other hand, the updates are largely aimed at 2024.
Thanks to the Netflix documentary series Drive to Survive, attention to Formula 1 has increased around the world, with Haas F1 boss Gunther Steiner becoming one of the most visible characters in the paddock.
“It would probably be an oversimplification to say that the rise of Formula 1 is thanks to the Netflix series,” said Steiner. – But there is also some truth in it. Drive to Survive was probably some kind of spark. It’s funny that I have been living in America for 17 years, and all this time my neighbor was not particularly interested in Formula 1, but then his son started watching this series, and now the whole family organizes special parties dedicated to watching to the races. And this happens everywhere.”
When Franz Tost retires at the end of this year, Steiner will remain third in the list of longest-serving team directors. He has been leading Haas F1 from the early days of this project and the team has made quite a loud statement about itself from the start by earning points in the first race.
After this, things didn’t always go well for several reasons, but this year, up until the Qatar stage, Haas took 8th place in the Constructors’ Championship, only now losing it to Alfa Romeo.
“We have some problems this year,” he admitted in a recent interview. – I want to say that at the beginning of the season everything went well, and then we stopped progressing, we were not able to increase the speed of the car.
We did not prepare any new items because our search for possible solutions led nowhere. So we had to completely change the chassis concept and go in a different direction. We’ll be rolling out a wide range of updates in Austin so we can continue moving in the same direction next year. So we plan to collect as much information as possible now. Let’s hope we can improve in the last five stages of the season.”
Returning to the topic of Formula 1’s popularity in the United States, Steiner said: “I believe expanding the American part of the championship calendar to three races is the right approach. Of course it’s good for Haas, but it’s also good for our sport as a whole. To be honest, three Grand Prix won’t be enough in the long run. However, I think we will stick with these three races in Miami, Austin and Las Vegas because we don’t want to oversaturate the market. Three races is enough, and better than too many.”
Source: F1 News

I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.