Nico Hulkenberg started off the 2019 season with a bang, scoring a princely P7 at the Australian Grand Prix, at Melbourne. At present, he is marginally out of the top ten in the current 2019 Driver Standings. In fact, he’s just 5 points shy of in-form teammate, Daniel Ricciardo.
A couple of great races ahead and the ‘Hulk’ could find himself competing for the top ten honors, the first valuable grid that a driver desires to ace in the unpredictable world of Formula 1 racing.
In the 11 races that he’s raced in thus far, he’s not scored in nearly half of them, despite having race-retired in 2, the Grands Prix at Bahrain and China. Yet, he’s somehow managed to score 17 valuable points.
But from the onset of the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix, wherein he matched his personal best finish as seen at the season opener, he’s gone on to collect a P8 at France and a P10 at Silverstone.
Nico Hulkenberg seems a grand albeit unfinished project of Formula 1.
It’s as if a promising sprinter finds a way to finish third and fourth every race when he seemed comfortably ahead in the lead. Thus leaving a lot to be desired.
Had he been a Renaissance creation, Nico Hulkenberg would’ve been an artist’s failed attempt to complete a masterpiece. As if something else more challenging attracted his endeavor. Or some natural calamity struck surprisingly. In Nico’s case, his world would’ve seen him court all the attention had the likes of Vettel, Hamilton, Verstappen in a Ferrari, Mercedes, or Red Bull (respectively) not have existed in the first place.
Without the troika, you’d think, he’d put up a strong case for the ‘best of the rest’ on the grid.
Not a driver you can describe enthusiastically with cosmological adjectives, Nico Hulkenberg’s talent brackets him in the ‘optimistic, promising’ space.
Every time where it seems, his form is dipping, the German ready to touch a new low, Nico Hulkenberg’s performances bail him out at the last crucial moment.
At Canada, he drove without a care for the world and enjoyed ‘excellent traction’ all throughout.
He was unbent in his focus at Silverstone, which was never easy, despite suffering a technical glitch in his RS19, not to mention that being hit by Perez wasn’t any less irksome.
Yet, he held onto a strong tenth.
The man who epitomizes his nickname, in a subdued manner
Now, all set to enter the 2019 German Grand Prix, there’s something about Nico Hulkenberg that warrants a strong finish. And it’s more than just good instincts or the strong sentimental reasons, this being his home race.
His nickname may often seem too weighty for his own good. Because when you say ‘The Hulk’, you expect someone to move mountains. Jump multiple cars and make a big splash inside the opening lap. Drive in a supremely elegant fashion overcoming several challenges, lack of grip, heavy curbing and on a bad day, sweltering temperatures.
Yet, Nico Hulkenberg’s somewhat understated persona economizes the massive expectation his alter ego produces.
If there’s a track where the staidly elegant driver has excelled and in customary quiet fashion then it’s the German Grand Prix. Wondering how?
Have you browsed Nico’s record at his home Grand Prix event?
Any fan of the German driver would be excited by the prospect of visiting Nico Hulkenberg’s’ form guide at the German Grand Prix.
There’s a lot in it that makes a strong case for the unyielding driver.
Not since the 2013 German Grand Prix has Hulkenberg failed to score a point at Hockenheimring or the Nurburgring. Rewind back over half a decade to the 2013 German Grand Prix and you find that Nico scored a tenth in a Sauber, outperforming Mexican Esteban Gutierez.
The 2014 German Grand Prix saw Hulkenberg drive home a fantastic P7, this time in a Force India. He had outscored his new teammate, Sergio Perez.
Strong run starting 2013 onward
The 2015 race never happened with Hockenheimring going off the calendar but Nico returned in 2016 to do a repeat of his last effort. In garnering a seventh that year, once again with Force India, the German put his car right behind Raikkonen’s Ferrari. Yet, he was ahead of Jenson and Magnussen.
The 2018 race saw Nico Hulkenberg gather his best-ever finish at the German Grand Prix. A fighting fifth meant that the Emmerich Am Rhein-born would outscore Carlos Sainz comprehensively and finish only behind the formidable troika of Mercedes, Ferrari, and Red Bull.
Perhaps that is why fans may not be dabbling with the implausible when they expect something special from the local hero this weekend.
With a vastly improved Renault, currently holding on mightily well against the likes of Toro Rosso, Alfa Romeo, McLaren, it would all boil down to a strong qualifying run on Saturday.
Can we once again see the German collect something special from a track that has seen such memorable performances from the 31-year-old?