Nico Hulkenberg says damage suffered on the opening lap of the Bahrain Grand Prix led to his Haas going through its tyres "like a hot knife through butter" during his opening stint.
Hulkenberg celebrated his return to F1 with a spot in Q3 and a lap that placed him P10 on Sunday's grid. But a scruffy first lap marked by a minor contact with Esteban Ocon's Alpine resulted in a slightly damaged front wing and a loss of four positions.
Heavy tyre degradation ensued which pushed the German further down the order, sealing the Hulk's fate for the remainder of the evening.
©Haas
"It was a tricky race – especially the first half," said Hulkenberg.
"I had contact with someone on lap one which I didn’t really notice so that was a bit frustrating. I had quite a lot missing from the front wing and lost a lot of load and grip with that, and that made the first half of the race very tough.
"We tried to hang in there, but I was going through my tyres like a hot knife through butter, so we decided there was no point in continuing like that and we pitted for a new front wing.
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Hulkenberg took away from his complicated race return the fact that Haas was able to gather significant more data on its VF-23 over the course of the evening.
"We did a race distance though and got lots of good information, so we’ll definitely take that," he said.
On the other side of the Haas garage, Kevin Magnussen made up for a mediocre P17 qualifying performance with a strong few opening laps that carried the Dane as high as 9th.
©Haas
But Magnussen eventually drifted back down the field after swapping his tyres for a second set of hards. In the end, the Dane concluded his race in 13th position.
"I was pleasantly surprised with our race pace," said Magnussen. "We started P17 but still made up a few positions and it felt like the pace was alright in terms of where we came from.
"I think we were struggling a lot in testing and on Friday with tyre wear and in the race it seemed like we made a step, which is positive.
"It wasn’t the weekend we dreamed of, but we learned a lot."
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