Haas’ Magnussen Won’t Be ‘Any More Friendly’ On Track in 2018
The Dane has become known for his aggressive driving style, and it looks like we’ll see more of the same this season.
Resident F1 bad boy Kevin Magnussen doesn't plan on easing up in 2018. Being one half of the yet-unproven Haas team, he'll be looking to build on the American crew's eighth-place finish in the manufacturers' standings from last year, and he apparently won't follow through with that by being kind and polite on-track. As the Dane recently told Denmark's BT publication, hard-nosed action will be a recurring theme for the upcoming 21-race calendar as he and the rest of Haas will face a tougher challenge starting in Melbourne this March.
Magnussen, who tipped off Nico Hulkenberg with one especially infamous quote last season, claims that his driving style will remain assertive albeit with a few tweaks after having learned from experience.
“I look at it like this,” he elaborated to BT. “If I get a penalty, then I’ve made a mistake. But with regards to racing against rivals, I only got one penalty last year. I need to learn from that.
“So this year, I’m going to try to drive just as hard without getting any penalties.
“That doesn’t mean I’m going to be any more friendly on the track. I hope to be even harder—just without any penalty.”
Magnussen has often been at odds with fellow drivers, having feuds that go both ways in many cases. His outspoken stance on four-time champion Lewis Hamilton earned him plenty of headlines last year, and the aforementioned spat with Renault's Hulkenberg was enough to gain him industry-wide backlash. Each of these interactions stemmed from on-track quarrels, and as it seems, Magnussen won't be backing down from his position for the sake of peace in 2018.