Renault F1 Team racer Nico Hülkenberg has said he is targeting a points finish in the upcoming Austrian Grand Prix, following a solid drive last time out at the team’s home race in France.
“Austria is a very warm and welcoming event hosted with a nice, chilled out atmosphere. It’s quite close to the German border, so there are usually a number of German fans who make the trip to come and support and that’s really great to see.” said Hülkenberg.
“The circuit is quite surreal as it’s in the middle of nowhere with lots of hills, empty fields and a lot of cows! It’s picturesque, a nice scene for a Formula 1 race and it freshens up this busy period of racing.”
The German said the Spielberg circuit is not the easiest on the calendar, but nonetheless they will be looking for consistent results throughout the weekend.
“The lap times are so short in Austria with just nine corners to negotiate, but that doesn’t mean it’s an easy place to drive. It’s quite the opposite.
“It’s technical, it has elevation changes, there’s a mix of medium to high-speed corners and also big kerbs to watch out for, especially the final two corners.
“We have some things to assess on Friday, but as ever we’ll be looking to get our heads down and progress ourselves through Friday, Saturday and Sunday and target a solid result at the end.”
Looking back on the last race in France, he added: “We can be happy with our recovery on race day, and it’s always nice to be scoring points. It does highlight the importance of qualifying and therefore track position.
“We were stuck in traffic for a lot of the race and I had more in the tank on Sunday, which might have allowed us to be higher in the top ten.
“The last couple of laps were a lot of fun with some good wheel-to-wheel racing. Hopefully in Austria there will be more of that and we’ll be coming out somewhere near the top end of the midfield!”
