Amid the hoopla surrounding Max Verstappen at the end of the Spanish GP a superb performance by Nico Hulkenberg and Sauber almost got lost in the mix.
The German was helped by the late safety car, and was gifted a place by Verstappen’s penalty. However he had been solidly in the points for most of the race, and his eventual P5 was well deserved.
It’s not been an easy year for Sauber thus far, and the Swiss team has often had the ninth or 10th fastest car on the grid.
Hulkenberg took some pressure off with a good early result in Melbourne, but that was more down to his tenacity and good strategy in the rain.
In Spain the team bolted some performance onto the car with a floor update that impressed Hulkenberg from the start on Friday.
However his qualifying session didn’t live up to the promise of practice, and he was squeezed out in P16, although Gabriel Bortoleto hinted at the true potential with 12th spot, having only got the updates on Saturday.
Hulkenberg then gained a spot from Lance Stroll’s withdrawal and from P15 on the grid he rode his luck around the first couple of corners, benefiting from a clash between Alex Albon and Liam Lawson, before getting ahead of both his team mate and Fernando Alonso.
Unexpectedly up to 10th on the first lap, he now had a very good chance of logging some points.
A relatively early first stop and a long second stint on the medium tyres put him in a strong position in the latter part of the race, and he was running ninth when Kimi Antonelli’s retirement handed him another spot, and brought out the safety car.
While everyone around him also pitted Hulkenberg had the benefit of new rather than used softs for the restart, and he used them to good effect to get ahead of Isack Hadjar and Lewis Hamilton to cross the line in P6, before the Verstappen penalty kicked in and gave him another position.
“It was a great race,” he said when I asked him about his afternoon. “Just one of those races where just everything seemed to click and to work out beautiful, when it happens. It doesn’t happen that often, unfortunately!
“A mixture. Having all these new tyres being out in Q1 actually was really useful and helpful today. And then, on the other hand, from 16th to have the start and lap one that I had kind of immediately reset the race, and then put us into the fight for a good result.
“And obviously the late safety car and then having another set of softs did the rest of it. So very happy. And obviously we take that, but that’s just if you bring updates and performance that works, you can help yourself.”
In the end the first lap charge made all the difference: “There was a car coming, sliding across, so both I think Gabby and I had to avoid Turn 2 and avoid some car, I’m not sure who it was.
“I had a bit of a little fight with Fernando also, I think, for one or two laps, but wrestled him down in the end. And that was good.”
Hulkenberg’s pass on Hamilton raised a few eyebrows, but he insists it wasn’t a fair fight.
“Well, he was on used, he only had used softs left. And that’s where you see, even though he’s in a Ferrari, how important and how powerful the tyres are, he was just sliding around a lot. And I had new boots, which made all the difference, to be honest.”
It was a great result too for the team, which has inevitably been in the spotlight amid management changes and with the focus that Audi’s ownership brings.
“It’s obviously a very sweet moment,” said Hulkenberg. “The second time points this year, but since Melbourne it has obviously been a bit of a dry patch.
“It’s been difficult, but I believe it puts us more on the map in the midfield fight. We’ve found the connection to that train. in quali things are very tight and everything needs to be right. But I feel like in the races, hopefully we can be there, push into it, and fight with all these other guys more.”
It was a perfect storm of circumstances, but the new floor played at least some role in moving Sauber up the order.
“I think it’s more the updates,” said Hulkenberg. “Maybe it’s the technical TD, the flexi wing stuff that others paid more of a price than us, because honestly, I feel for us, it didn’t change that much.
“I don’t feel much different in high-speed. And to be honest, high-speed so far has been not our strongest point. So I tend to believe it is the update.”
The team has promised another package – already designed and currently in manufacture. The fact that this one translated to the track so well appears to be a sign that the restructure is coming together, and new people are gelling.
“Absolutely,” said Nico. “And P5 obviously we can only dream of in normal races and circumstances. But I think it was a P8 or P9 before the safety car, which already would have been really, really good for us.
“So, I think just happy, everyone in the factory, can be happy that the update delivered. It’s what we needed. We can’t stop here, because nobody stops. We need kind of more of the same.”
Adam Cooper F1 