Renault Sport Formula 1 Team‘s Nico Hülkenberg says he is satisfied with his qualifying effort for the 2017 Mexican Grand Prix which sees the German start in eighth place.
The thirty-year-old managed to comfortably advance through the first two sessions in his RS17, and ultimately ended up 0.978 seconds off the pole time set by Sebastian Vettel, and not that far away from Red Bull Racing‘s Daniel Ricciardo, who was just 0.019 seconds faster in eighth.
“It was a good qualifying, I got a really good lap at the end of Q3 so I’m very happy and satisfied about that,” said Hülkenberg.
Hülkenberg has seen a fresh challenge within the Renault team following the arrival of Carlos Sainz Jr. as the Spaniard replaced Jolyon Palmer, and in Sainz’s first outing for the Enstone-based team at the 2017 United States Grand Prix, he managed to out-qualify Hülkenberg, something Palmer had not managed all season.
This weekend therefore, it was important for Hülkenberg to address the situation, and he did so by out-qualifying Sainz by 0.328 seconds, and the German is expecting a close fight between them in Sunday’s race.
“It’s going to be a tight battle tomorrow but we are going to push hard and do our best,” insisted Hülkenberg.
