Nico Hulkenberg says he wants to “go out strong” by helping his Haas Formula 1 team to secure sixth place in the World Championship before he leaves at the end of the season.
Having recently overhauled VCARB in the battle for sixth Haas lost the position to Alpine in Brazil when the Enstone team logged a double podium.
However Hulkenberg’s eighth place finish in Las Vegas, achieved by a crucial pass on Yuki Tsunoda in the closing stages, saw Haas regain the position.
“Every point matters, for sure,” he said when asked by this writer about the significance of the Las Vegas result. “For now, I’m just happy that we maximised the opportunity today.”
“We had the pace, but it was certainly a tough and challenging race with the tyres, and with graining.”
“I guess at least everyone in the midfield had the same symptoms and difficulties. But I think we managed it well.”
“We offset our strategy a bit, decided to delay the stops, to have fresher tyres at the end. And that worked well and paid off, so happy.”
In the late stages Hulkenberg had to fend off Fernando Alonso while also trying to find a way past Tsunoda.
“Obviously we know that we have a bit better pace than Aston at the moment,” he said.
“And he had quite old tyres compared to me, I think his tyres were more than 10 laps older.”
“He was there, but I knew that I probably always could control him. It was more about managing my tyres in Yuki’s dirty air and managing the battery in the right moment to get him.”
Hulkenberg says he’s relishing the challenge of trying to secure sixth place for Haas.
“I enjoy myself very much in the team,” he noted. “I’ve said that many times. And obviously I want to go out strong. And I think we’ve done a really good job over the winter and all this year.”
“And I would like obviously to celebrate with the team in Abu Dhabi Sunday night. It’s two to go, it will go down to the wire. Nobody else is going to hand it to us. So we have to earn it, and do a good job in the next two.”
