Nico Hülkenberg: “We looked better today than we have in the past few races on Sunday”

Nico Hülkenberg felt his MoneyGram Haas F1 Team car had performed better than expected during Sunday’s Hungarian Grand Prix, but it was still not good enough to score a top ten finish.

Hülkenberg had started the race at the Hungaroring inside the top ten but expected his race to be more difficult, something that has been a common theme throughout the 2023 FIA Formula 1 World Championship season.

The German racer finished the day in fourteenth, not far away from the points, and although he acknowledged it was not good enough on the day, it was not as bad as expected going into the race.

“Not good enough in the race, which wasn’t news really, we kind of knew and expected this,” said Hülkenberg.  

“To be fair though, I think we looked better today than we have in the past few races on Sunday, so I’m not too disappointed – given this is one of the toughest of the season in terms of non-stop corners, and there isn’t much rest for the tyres or the driver.

“We weren’t too far behind drivers that were in the points, so maybe it was actually a bit better than what I was expecting going into today.”

“I’m not feeling very good about the results” – Kevin Magnussen

Team-mate Kevin Magnussen was not as complimentary about his race, with the Dane finished seventeenth, the final of those drivers who saw the chequered flag.

Magnussen admitted that he should perhaps had switched to a three-stop strategy rather than sticking to the two stop particularly with the way his Haas car was going through his tyres and losing performance.

He says it is important to learn more about the VF-23 despite having another tough day, and he cannot wait for updates to come to the car to bring themselves closer to the top ten.

“I’m not feeling very good about the results, it’s a disappointing day for us,” said Magnussen. “I had no pace on the hard tyre, we had two long stints on the hards – probably should’ve been on a three stop.

“We always try and learn something from each race – we’re going to try and do something different for Belgium. It’s important at this point to be patient and wait for some upgrades.

“We have to keep our heads cool and move onto the next one.”

Kevin Magnussen finished seventeenth in Hungary – Credit: Steven Tee / LAT Images