Starting from the 15th position, German driver Nico Hülkenberg (Sauber) made a fantastic comeback to finish fifth in the Spanish Grand Prix on Sunday.
Nico Hülkenberg (5th, Sauber), speaking to Canal+: “I am very, very happy. It’s very positive and it’s a great result for us. It doesn’t happen that often and the wait has been long since Melbourne to score points again. Yesterday (Saturday), I was quite furious and disappointed (16th time in qualifying but 15th on the grid after Stroll’s withdrawal) and I wanted to make up for it in the race. The improvements made by the team worked well and put us back in the fight of the pack.”
(About his overtaking of Hamilton at the end of the race) These are race circumstances, I think he only had worn tyres left while I had new ones, those I had saved in qualifying. It turned out to be a bit like a winning lottery ticket. Sometimes, things have to go wrong to work better the next day.”
McLaren scored a one-two finish at the Spanish GP: Oscar Piastri won ahead of Lando Norris.
Isack Hadjar (7th, Racing Bulls), speaking to Canal+: “This might be my best weekend of the year. Monaco was quite crazy, but here, honestly, I felt very solid, especially in qualifying. I maximized what the car could do, we were really good in race pace, the strategy was good. I’m super happy. It’s just a shame that Hülkenberg overtook us at the end but it was impossible to hold him back with his new tyres. He was too fast.”
We had a good fight with Pierre Gasly (Gasly) on the first lap. We overtook each other, I made a small mistake behind Antonelli and he passed me. After the pit stop, I caught up with him, I had a big tyre advantage. It certainly made overtaking easier, but it’s always cool to fight with him.
It gives a lot of confidence. I’m so comfortable in my team and in my car that we’re only going to get better. After succeeding on a track like Monaco, which is very technical and somewhat the ultimate challenge, I have no more doubts for the second half of the season.
Pierre Gasly (8th, Alpine), speaking to Canal+:
“In terms of our performance, we had a good race but we will need to review what we could have done better. We reacted very early on the first stop, but on the second, we lost quite a bit of time with the blue flags. Overall, we are very happy to score points.
(On his battle with Hadjar) They made the right choice to go further on the first stint and then he came back very strong on the medium tyres. We tried to fight but we didn’t have much pace so we couldn’t keep him behind us for long. But at least, we are fighting for points. We have to see the positive. Yesterday (Saturday), I managed to do a very good lap in qualifying to put us in the top 10. We are barely holding on but we are taking four points. We know that Sundays are a bit more complicated and that’s what we need to work on.”
