The 2023 championship will start in March with the usual changes on the starting grid, made up of rookie riders or others who will participate with other teams than those in which they played the previous season. A unique case is that of German Nico Hulkenbergreturning for the first time since 2019 as an official guide despite four participations in the middle in the role of substitute.
The 35-year-old, who boasts 181 GP races in his career, has been announced as the new driver for the Haas at the end of the last championship, replacing Mick Schumacher, not reconfirmed by the American team and later became Mercedes test driver. A choice that has generated divisions among enthusiasts, with some of them against Günther Steiner’s decision not to count on the 23-year-old son of the same family anymore, and others still in favor of his departure, but not entirely convinced by the decision to nominate the more experienced Hülkenberg.
Interviewed by rtl extension a few days after the presentations of the single-seaters and the subsequent pre-season tests, the new Haas driver lingered on his role as replacement, confirming that he had never had any kind of relationship with Schumacher, in addition to not feeling guilty ‘ for replacing the young German: “Mick and I have never exchanged opinions even in the past – has explained – he is part of another generation. We have never had a real relationship, like the one he has, for example, with Sebastian Vettel. The story is what it is. If it wasn’t me, it could have been someone else“. A circumstance that Hülkenberg lived on his skin at the end of the 2019 season, when he was not reconfirmed by Renault and subsequently signed for Aston Martin, also in that case as third driver: “F1 is a question of performance, if you convince you have a job and you are a valuable piece, but if there is no performance, then it ends very soon“.
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