Nico Hülkenberg (Audi) without World Championship points: Will the misery continue at Silverstone?

Audi will start the Silverstone Sprint from 12th (Gabriel Bortoleto) and 13th (Nico Hülkenberg) on the grid. This does not bode well for the short race on 4 July, as World Championship points are only awarded to the top eight finishers.

In none of the 2026 Sprints held so far (Shanghai, Miami, Montreal) has an Audi scored points, Nico Hülkenberg – who finished a fabulous third at Silverstone in 2025 – remains without a single point, one of only four drivers yet to score (alongside the Cadillac duo of Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas, and Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll).

The frustrating thing is that Audi’s pace means the drivers are always in contention for a top-ten finish, but for various reasons, they haven’t managed to finish in the points since Melbourne. Sometimes the technology plays a trick on the drivers, sometimes there’s a pit stop that doesn’t go 100 per cent to plan, sometimes a penalty, sometimes a questionable race strategy, and sometimes it’s just plain bad luck.

So will Nico Hülkenberg’s run of bad luck continue in England too? The driver, who has competed in 257 Grand Prix races, said of his performance on 3 July: “I don’t think we made the most of everything today. The conditions were windier and more gusty than in free practice, and it seemed that this affected us slightly more than some of our rivals.”

Audi’s racing director, Allan McNish, adds: “Sprint weekends always present an additional challenge, as you have to focus all your preparations on a single free practice session, whilst keeping an eye on the rest of the weekend at the same time.”

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“Overall, our performance in free practice met our expectations and showed that we had the potential to fight for a place in the top ten in Sprint Qualifying.” (Nico Hülkenberg in P9, M.B.)

The Scot continued: “We got through SQ1 comfortably, but none of the cars managed a really clean lap in SQ2, which ultimately left us in 12th and 13th places. That’s below what we’d hoped for, but there’s still plenty to be gained. Our focus is now on making the most of tomorrow’s sprint race before we refocus for the Grand Prix qualifying later in the day.”