All teams to reach budget limit in 2023 – Steiner

Dec.14 (GMM) Haas will hit Formula 1’s budget limit in 2023, team boss Gunther Steiner has revealed.

The small American team, eighth overall this year, ended the season by announcing that Ferrari-backed Mick Schumacher will be replaced by Nico Hulkenberg in 2023.

That is in part possible thanks to the arrival of a title sponsor – Moneygram.

“Next year we will reach the budget cap and I am confident that we can take the next step, technically and as a team,” Steiner told motorsport-total.com.

“Because we can now do what other teams can do. And I don’t think it’s just us – everyone else will hit the budget cap next year,” he added.

However, Steiner explained that Haas was actually quite close to the budget cap limit in 2022.

“But I don’t think we performed like other teams,” he admitted. “Not because of money, but because of where we started.

Indeed, amid the covid crisis, the looming all-new 2022 rules and the establishment of a facility on the Ferrari factory grounds, Steiner explained that “in 2020 we shut everything down”.

“When we started it was January and you can’t have a team of people working together perfectly and in harmony from day one,” Steiner said.

“So it took a while, but at the beginning of the year we were still quite strong. Then something was missing.

“It was up and down, but Formula 1 is just a tough place. I think we discovered why things went the way they did.”