F1: Hulkenberg Surprised To Make Top 10

Formula 1

F1: Hulkenberg Surprised To Make Top 10

Force India-Mercedes driver pleased with team effort...

Adam Cooper | http://www.speedtv.com | Posted March 17, 2012 Melbourne (AUS)

Mercedes driver Nico Hulkenberg of Germany speeds through a corner during qualifying for Formula One's Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne on March 17, 2012. (Photo: Getty Images)

Nico Hulkenberg admits that he was surprised to make it into Q3 for his first race since he left Williams at the end of 2010.

The German will start his Sahara Force India from ninth after struggling in the final practice session prior to qualifying.

“I think it’s a great start for me, and to have the first qualifying go this way and get into Q3 is a nice surprise,” he said. “I’m very pleased and happy with that. It was a good team effort today as things looked a bit tricky after FP3, but we really stretched ourselves and did a good job there. Let’s hope for a good result tomorrow.”

Hulkenberg conceded that it was hard to get back into the qualifying groove after a year away.

“In Q1 I struggled a bit to find my rhythm, it was a bit difficult. It’s been a while, and qualifying is also a very special atmosphere or moment, it’s quite high stress. It’s, ‘What is the balance?’, some quick comments with the engineers, new tires, and off you go again! It’s something that you can’t really simulate that well in practice. And in qualifying you just have that one lap, while in testing you can always back off and have another go. Here it’s for real! Taking all this into account, I’m really happy with how qualifying went.”

Regarding his race prospects, he said: “It’s an unknown, there’s quite a question mark about how things will go and how tires will behave. You just have to learn as you go, and report the tyre status back to the engineer. They will keep an eye on everybody else’s tires. I think you’ve got to be pretty open minded and flexible tomorrow.”

Adam Cooper notched up his 27th season as a racing journalist in 2011. He has written about F1 for SPEED.com since 2005. Follow him on Twitter.