Guenther Steiner has branded his exit from Red Bull Racing as “lucky” because it opened the door for him to move and work in the United States.
Before his time as Haas Formula 1 team principal, Steiner worked alongside Christian Horner at the Milton Keynes outfit as technical operations director in 2005. But after Red Bull hired Adrian Newey, Steiner moved to North Carolina to serve as technical director of Red Bull’s NASCAR team – a position he held from April 2006 to April 2008.
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“For me, it worked out perfectly,” Steiner told FanAmp. “I mean it became crowded and for me now looking back that was my lucky moment when I left because it opened the door to the States.
“I always wanted to live in the States when I was younger but never could because you need a work visa, you need to do something, and it opened that avenue for me, and once I was here, now you cannot get rid of me anymore.”
After moving to America and leaving the Red Bull NASCAR team, Steiner founded a manufacturing company, Fibreworks Composites, in January 2009.
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“So first of all, I opened my own company,” he continued. “Now we’ve got 300 people, which is a pretty successful company.
Guenther Steiner
Guenther Steiner
“And then it gave me the opportunity to start an F1 team which if I would have done the same in Europe, I wouldn’t have succeeded because I wouldn’t have found an investor and if I would have tried out of Europe to find an American investor I don’t think he would have done [a deal] with me because it’s too far away.
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“It’s too far apart in the world, and I needed to learn the American culture to find somebody to speak the same language because if I speak European culture to an American businessman, he’s not going to do business with me.
“For me, it was the best thing to have happened in my life to leave, to leave Red Bull.”
Steiner went on to become the team principal of Haas F1 from 2014 to 2023, when he was replaced by Ayao Komatsu.
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