How Nico Hulkenberg's return to F1 has been different from Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen's

F1 journalist Valentin Khorounzhiy feels that Nico Hulkenberg's return to F1 is quite different in comparison to that of Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen. As it stands, the German driver has been performing admirably well in Haas and is easily beating his teammate, Kevin Magnussen.

While speaking on The Race F1 podcast, Khorounzhiy explained how people usually talk about the experience of an F1 driver and how it helps them perform well. However, when it comes to Nico Hulkenberg, he feels that the experience factor doesn't apply to the German. Unlike other experienced drivers, Hulkenberg was still extremely fast in qualifying. Khorounzhiy stated:

"Experience is an important factor, obviously, and we always talk about it. We always try to assess just how important that is versus that raw rookie pace, but the thing with Hulkenberg is and his return, it does not fit the mold of experience. It's not what you expect from a 35-year-old driver in Formula 1. If you bring in a 35-year-old driver, you expect him to lose half a step in qualifying and then short it up with consistent point scoring."

Shortly after, the F1 journalist used the example of Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen as having a different kind of return in comparison to Nico Hulkenberg:

"I think we see that up and down the grid all the time these past few years. I mean, the examples are clear...You know what, I don't think Alonso over one lap is as quick as he used to be, for instance. I just think he still quick enough to where it does not matter. But there are people with a more holistic overview of Fernando Alonso's career who can argue with me there. But the examples I would bring are Kimi Raikkonen, later carreer in Ferrari and particularly Alfa Romeo."

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Nico Hulkenberg spoke about a scary moment in the 2023 F1 Australian GP

After a rather chaotic 2023 F1 Australian GP, Nico Hulkenberg spoke about how he felt when he narrowly avoided crashing into Alex Albon. Unfortunately, the Thai driver crashed into the wall at turn three and was standing still with the rear of his car protruding out onto the track.

As a result, Hulkenberg had to react extremely quickly to avoid Albon's car. It was even more difficult to do so as the crash had created a dust cloud around the turn, with the Haas driver stating:

"Holy moly, I mean seriously I had a code brown in that moment. That was seriously scary. I mean, thank God nothing happened. But this is a nightmare scenario. You've come around a blind corner in a street circuit. I mean, that was seriously scary and sketchy. That's a bad example of a driver losing the car, crashing and coming back onto the track, and because there's a gravel trap, there was dust, so you could not really see much."

Despite all of this chaos, Hulk was able to finish at P7 and pick up some points for his team.