Hulkenberg: Force India paid for mistakes in race

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Nico Hulkenberg says Force India was made to pay for its mistakes during the Grand Prix of Europe after starting low on the grid.

Force India was strong on the Baku City Circuit but Hulkenberg dropped out in Q2 on Saturday after spinning on his first run and then a miscommunication seeing him back off at the wrong time later in the session. The performance was underlined by team-mate Sergio Perez qualifying second, and although he started from seventh place Perez still managed to finish on the podium.

After finishing the race in ninth place, when asked if the weekend should have come to him, Hulkenberg replied: "Well, should, should, yeah.

"Our pace was good all weekend. But if you make mistakes you pay for it. And that is what happened."

Hulkenberg started on the soft tyre and ran a long final stint on mediums which saw him lose out to both Red Bull drivers in the closing laps.

"At the end there was nothing left. A tricky old race. The start was actually quite good. I think I would have had one, two positions, but then I got hit in the back into Turn 1. I am not sure who it was. I avoided a spin but it made me lose a couple of positions. And I think I was back in 14th at the exit of Turn 1.

"From there onwards I had to go through traffic, and lost a lot of time there initially. I used a lot of tires for that, and that made it quite difficult. We had to take the risks, drop off the softs early and go to the supersofts for 30, 31 laps. It was a big ask. We knew it was a bit of a risk, but I was happy to take it at the time."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.