Nico Hulkenberg joined the critical voices against restarts at the Australian Grand Prix, especially with the second restart, for the last two laps of the race after the impact suffered by Kevin Magnussenwho lost one of the rear tires.
Checo Pérez’s former teammate in Force India, agreed with Lando Norris and Fernando Alonso in the aspect that Formula 1 gave more weight to the theme of the show with a dramatic two-lap race finish, which fell apart after multiple crashes after the first corner, in which both Alpine cars were knocked out.
Formula 1 was looking for a show, says Hulkenberg
‘Hulk’ considered that a relaunch from the grid was not necessary, which, in addition, is usually unfair to pilots like Fernando Alonso, who was about to run out of points after being hit by Carlos Sainz’s car, which caused chaos.
“Of course, another start is exciting, but it is also something that is done for the show.. As a driver, everything feels strange, because you have worked through a race, you have a few laps left and then it all starts again. It’s a double-edged sword, and we have to discuss what happened.”, said the German, who returned to Formula 1 after missing three seasons.
The decision of the second relaunched felt artificial
Hulkenberg mentioned that the second relaunch was actually something artificial, because like George Russell, Checo Pérez or Max Verstappen, he indicated that the red flag was unnecessary after the accident of his Haas teammate Magnussen.
“Take Fernando Alonso as an example. He spun on the second restart and it was a nightmare scenario for a driver after driving such a good race.. The whole weekend that she had been going so well seemed to be going down the drain. He was then allowed to take his original position. Just like I’ve known and appreciated the DNA of the queen class for years, it felt contrived”, commented.
In passing, he criticized Race Control for taking so long to make a decision, which caused confusion. “That was going to cause big arguments later, and that’s exactly what’s happening now.”said.
