After starting the race from the front row, the Austrian Grand Prix quickly unravelled for Nico Hülkenberg, as he lost places at the start and struggled with graining on his tyres before retiring from the race whilst well outside the points with brake issues.
The Sahara Force India driver had gone into the race with high hopes of a strong result after a brilliant effort during qualifying, but was unable to match those hopes, and the German found it hard to digest post-race.
“I’m pretty disappointed and gutted, to be honest,” said Hülkenberg. “It was a really tough race and nothing really worked out for us.
“The start wasn’t great and I dropped a couple of positions on lap one, but the opening stint was very difficult because the car was sliding around and the tyres were graining.
“That became the story of my race because the balance of the car wasn’t allowing me to manage the tyres and I was suffering with so much graining. With a new set I could manage just three of four laps before they fell away.
“Towards the end of the race I had some vibrations with the car and the team saw that I was critical on brake wear, which is why we retired the car in the end. We have to digest and understand what happened today and then look forward to Silverstone.”
