Former Haas team boss Guenther Steiner continued his UK tour at the Octagon Centre, treating the Sheffield audience to a peek behind the (very expensive) curtains of the chaotic world of Formula 1 racing.
Famed for his creative use of the English language on Netflix’s Drive to Survive series, Guenther was arguably the breakout star of the streaming platform’s F1 docuseries, despite his protests that he has never actually watched a minute of it!
Despite only recently coming to prominence in the public arena, for non-racing fans at least, Guenther has an incredibly impressive CV and a far-from-conventional route into the sport. Following his sacking by ‘Uncle Gene’ in January this year, he’s had his time freed up to travel around the UK telling his story and hawking whisky.
Joined on stage by his friend and ghostwriter, often referred to as ‘Guenther’s Ghost’ (Guenther has his own alliterative but less wholesome name for him), James Hogg is there to guide us through the life and career of Guenther.
After a jarring introduction by Gordon Ramsay on the big screen, who is presumably tenuously linked to Guenther by virtue of being another sweary man off the telly, we start by hearing of Guenther’s early life in the hills of northern Italy.
From humble beginnings as the son of a butcher, Guenther really isn’t like the other, often spoon-fed, nepo babies of the sport or the failed racing driver team principals like Toto Wolff or everyone’s favourite hate figure and alleged sex pest, Christian Horner.
He’s legitimately worked his way up, from blagging a job at Mazda and learning English on the fly – which explains his less-than-conventional use of the language – to his success with Colin McRae and Carlos Sainz Snr. in the World Rally Championship. All these experiences led to his introduction to F1 legend Niki Lauda at Ford Jaguar F1 and his subsequent route into the sport.
Hogg’s questioning eventually steers Guenther to talk about his role in setting up the Haas Formula 1 Team from scratch in the 2010s. With a fraction of the finances and infrastructure of the big teams and an incredibly turbulent tenure, it’s almost a miracle Guenther managed to keep the team on the road for almost a decade.
Guenther explains how his vision of a customer car (essentially buying parts from Ferrari and only making the bits they had to under the legislation) became contentious around the paddock, probably because they were seeing some success in the midfield of the championship, even scoring points in their debut start on the grid in 2016.
After this initial success, in 2020 the pandemic proved to be a very difficult time for the team. With no money coming in, Guenther was forced to try and find sponsorship when Gene Haas, who Guenther had convinced to put his money behind the start-up F1 team, allowing Guenther to oversee all aspects of its running, closed his chequebook.
Guenther proved instrumental in keeping the team going through this period, boosting morale and being pivotal in introducing the spending cap to ensure that smaller teams like Haas didn’t go to the wall.
If the trials and tribulations of the pandemic described in the first half hadn’t been enough to deal with, in the second half of the show, Guenther begins by taking us through the next roadblock for Team Haas.
Having secured sponsorship, the 2022 season should have been a relative Sunday drive from there on in. The only problem was that the funding came from a Russian oligarch with links to Putin, who, in exchange for sponsorship with his company Uralkali, had his son and F1 rookie Nikita Mazepin installed in one of the Haas driver seats. What could possibly go wrong?
Turns out, quite a lot. Nikita proved unpopular before he’d even sat his privileged backside down in a Haas car, after posting an Instagram story in which he is seen grabbing a woman by her breast in the back of a car. After navigating the scandal and calls for Mazepin to be dropped, Guenther explains, ‘that was the end of the problems with Nikita, outside of an F1 car!’
It turns out, as well as behaving abhorrently off the track, ‘Maze-spin’ wasn’t very good as a driver either. But in the end, that didn’t really matter as Russia invaded Ukraine and Guenther was thrown into the eye of another storm. Guenther’s instinct was to cut ties with Russia, ending both Mazepin’s and Uralkali’s contracts with Haas.
Applause rippled through the audience as Guenther expressed his feelings of disgust that Russia had invaded Ukraine.
The mood is lifted slightly as Hogg moves Guenther onto his relationship with former F1 driver Ralf Schumacher, who is the uncle of former Haas F1 driver Mick Schumacher, the offspring of seven-time champ Michael Schumacher.
Basically, Ralf hates Guenther, and, well, Guenther is indifferent to Ralf but often finds himself on the receiving end of social media outbursts from Ralf. The vitriol often relates to his treatment of Mick, who ultimately had to leave the team as he kept crashing the car, and Guenther grew concerned about the driver’s well-being.
After a slightly wooden re-enactment of Guenther’s infamous “He does not fok smash my door” scene from Drive to Survive and an audience Q&A, his recent sacking from Haas is given little mention, presumably so the audience buys Guenther’s new book, an act they need little encouragement with, as the merch-mad F1 crowd ransack the merch table pre- and post-show.
As the evening draws to a close, Guenther thanks the audience to rapturous applause, and he seems genuinely humbled by the adoration. Throughout the evening, his trademark swearing has been on show (give the masses what they want, eh, Guenther?) and the show is genuinely funny thanks to Steiner’s trademark wit and Hogg’s knowing, leading questions. But as Guenther thoughtfully talked us through his life and values, you just couldn’t help but fall for the guy – he’s a good dude. Just don’t slam his door!
