Mick Schumacher’s name has created “huge pressure” says the Haas Formula 1 team boss, and that “Schumi’s environment was never much help”.

For two years Mick Schumacher and Gunther Steiner worked side by side at Team Haas. Then the cooperation, which was quite complicated, especially in the final phase, came to an end. The reason for this was not only the young German’s lack of sporting results.

Haas ditched Schumacher

It is no secret that Mick Schumacher and Günther Steiner were no longer on the same wavelength by the end of the 2022 Formula 1 season at the latest. The fragile relationship between the two was documented in detail in the Netflix documentary “Drive to Survive”.

In Steiner’s newly published book “Surviving to Drive”, the Italian team boss from South Tyrol goes into even more detail about the difficulties of the collaboration.

Steiner was particularly angry about Schumacher’s accident in Suzuka. In a wet practice session, the German put his car into the wall on the way to the pits and caused repair costs of 700,000 US dollars.

“It happened on the f***ing in-lap. On the in-lap!” wrote Steiner about said scene.

“Of course it was very wet on the track, but no one else managed to lose a car on the way back to the pits. We lost a car after five minutes and had to build a new one.”

Steiner claims high costs by Mick

Continuing, the South Tyrolean from Italy ranted, “I can’t have a driver who I don’t trust to get a car safely through a slow lap. That’s ridiculous. How many people could we have hired for 700,000 US dollars? And now I have to find the money somewhere.”

The Suzuka incident was just one of many after which Steiner and Schumacher clashed. In the end, it became too much for the South Tyrolean and also owner Gene Haas.

MORE F1 NEWS – Leaked Ferrari options: Sainz ‘the chop’ – Hamilton the target

Ukraine & budget issues meant action required

The Haas coffers were really tight at the beginning of 2022, when the team had to part with its main sponsor Uralkali in the wake of the Russian attack on Ukraine. But according to Steiner, there was absolutely no alternative to this step.

“If we had kept Uralkali as a sponsor and had them on our livery, we would have been crucified by the media, the fans and the FIA. It would have been suicide,” he writes in his book.

“We were at a point where if we hadn’t acted now, our other sponsors would have left Haas. And if we had waited any longer, we would have ended up with no sponsors at all,” Steiner says, explaining the separation from his Russian backer.

Gene Haas destroys Schumacher

In the Netflix show, Drive to Survive, the climax for Haas came in the race in Monaco at the swimming pool chicane Mick lost control of his car, which tore in two after the impact. Mick remains uninjured, but the mood at Haas is more tense than ever after this race.

Team owner Gene Haas even denies Schumacher his abilities in a telephone conversation with Steiner saying “It takes talent. You can’t develop talent.”

Schumacher name a problem

“It was all difficult because Mick’s name created a huge pressure,” Steiner writes in his book about the high expectations associated with the name Schumacher.

In addition, “Schumi’s environment was never a great help to Mick,” judges the South Tyrolean, who was criticised from many sides after the German’s expulsion.

In the end, however, Steiner had some good arguments on his side. First and foremost, the accident costs, which were Schumacher’s fault. In total, the South Tyrolean put the damage at around two million euros – too much money for a racing team that only has limited resources.

READ MORE: Haas F1 boss questions Magnussen’s future

Never leave the garage without your gloves and steering wheel! 😆#AzerbaijanGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/naD7PwwoAr

— Formula 1 (@F1) April 23, 2023