Nico Hülkenberg’s decision to quit Haas and join the future Audi team had been a long time coming, but the timing of the German veteran’s announcement was surprising.
In a market that had featured as many as 12 drivers out of contract, the latest piece of the 2025 puzzle had fallen into place unexpectedly quickly.
Many of Hülkenberg’s rival free agents are race winners, podium finishers and pole getters. To swoop before the end of April for the 36-year-old, who holds the unenviable record of never having finished higher than fourth, seems premature.
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That’s especially true while the team already counts the more experienced and more successful Valtteri Bottas in its ranks. The Finn might have lost some of his Mercedes lustre, but he continues to perform at a high level, and his 10 grand prix victories and 20 poles — almost all of which were scored against Lewis Hamilton — are still relevant today.
And to be fair to Hülkenberg, the same argument also applies in reverse. Though his CV is baron of trophies, his 208-start career imbues him with a valuable level of experience that he’ll take from Haas, which is at least competing for sixth in the standings after scrapping for points, to Sauber, which is dead last in the constructors standings with limited prospects of a short-term turnaround.
The promise of Audi funding gives the switch some long-term upside, but there’s no guarantee Hülkenberg will see much of it before the end of a two or even three-year deal, so huge is the task of hauling the team from the very back of the pack.
On paper it reads like an unduly hasty decision for what from both sides appears like a thoroughly sideways and unimaginative move.
But it’s the move that’s kicked the market into motion and confirmed that several drivers are now at risk of losing their spots in Formula 1 by the end of the year — or in some cases even earlier.
PIT TALK PODCAST: Audi has made its first foray into the driver market by snapping up Nico Hulkenberg from Haas, and Carlos Sainz is widely rumoured to be the team’s next target — if Red Bull Racing doesn’t get to him first.
WHY HÜLKENBERG?
Hülkenberg was sought after by the future Audi project for the same reasons Haas brought him back from retirement: he’s a safe, steady pair of hands and can contribute to building a team by drawing on his decade of F1 knowledge, having competed with four engine manufacturers and five different teams in that time.
But his experience is only part of the equation. While he’s well tenured and his speed is well regarded, he’s not a star signing for Audi.
His induction serves two ends: giving Audi a fresh start and bringing a German name into the fold.
Sauber’s odd two-year transition from Alfa Romeo sponsorship to Audi ownership won’t go down as a memorable chapter in the independent team’s history.
Hinwil has sold out its name to a mishmash of sponsors — one an online cryptocurrency casino, the other a streaming service accused of “degenerate” conduct — that’s left it painfully lacking meaningful identity.
In a weird way it’s worked. The team is difficult to identify with Alfa Romeo and certainly with previous iterations of Sauber, and it will feel nothing like Audi once the German brand formally takes the reins.
Unfortunately that’s counted against Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu, however. Both have acquitted themselves well, but both are likely to be swept aside in the quest for new beginnings.
Hülkenberg’s German nationality has helped to ensure it.
Audi has pitched itself as the sport’s ‘true’ German entry, having pointed out in an earlier dig at Mercedes that it is building its power unit in Bavaria and will run the team from Sauber’s headquarters just south of the border in German-speaking Switzerland.
Mercedes’s cars and engines are built in the UK.
No serious team would hire a driver for their passport alone, but Hülkenberg is the perfect compromise candidate, being roughly as good as any other available midfielder while also bolstering the team’s identity.
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WHO WILL REPLACE HIM AT HAAS?
Haas loses its more effective driver, with Hülkenberg having shaded Kevin Magnussen last season and so far having done the sane me this year, even if the margin isn’t huge. Most of the difference between them has come during qualifying, with less splitting them in race conditions.
It takes one problem out of the hands of new team boss Ayao Komatsu, however.
Ferrari protégé Oliver Bearman is heavily tipped to begin his F1 apprenticeship with Haas next season, especially after impressing in his sudden Saudi outing for the unwell Carlos Sainz earlier this year.
Bearman will enter six FP1 sessions with Haas this season — way more than the mandatory two per team — starting with the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix later in May.
WHO FILLS THE SECOND SAUBER SEAT?
Carlos Sainz has been connected to the Audi project long before he was ousted at Ferrari.
He has an existing relationship with Sauber CEO Andreas Seidl, who was McLaren team principal while the Spaniard was racing in orange. Stella has rated him ever since, and Sainz’s Ferrari exploits have only enhanced his reputation.
Then there’s the institutional connection between Audi and the Sainz family. Carlos Sainz Senior won his first two Dakar Rally victories with Audi parent company Volkswagen in 2008 and 2010. Earlier this year he won the famous rally raid for Audi itself for the first time in the brand’s history.
But Audi is a long-term project, and Sainz would be committing the most competitive years of his career to a plan that might not pay off. The cost cap means manufacturers can’t spend their way to rapid success; the rebuild from Sauber’s low base will be long and painful.
Sainz would much prefer to take a seat at Red Bull Racing, either alongside or in the place of Max Verstappen. He’s expected to delay the decision for as long as possible to keep that option open.
If not Sainz, Esteban Ocon has been touted as being next on the list. The 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix winner would undoubtedly give an offer serious consideration given Alpine’s dire form and uncertain outlook, with Renault having already had to deny speculation it could be open to selling.
While Hülkenberg would offer a stern challenge, Ocon’s youth would give him the chance to position himself as Audi’s long-term future.
SARGEANT ON THE CHOPPING BLOCK
Hülkenberg’s decision has pushed the driver market into its next stage. By the end of it several drivers are likely to have lost their spots in Formula 1.
Four drivers are in significant peril: Logan Sargeant, Zhou Guanyu, Valtteri Bottas and Kevin Magnussen.
Sargeant is most at risk, having been yet to establish himself as a potential mainstay in his second year in the sport.
His record alongside Alex Albon is very poor.
He was subjected to a rare whitewash last year, defeated in every qualifying session, sprint and grand prix. Albon obliterated in him terms of pure pace with an average 0.581-second margin over a single lap, the biggest gap between any 2023 teammates.
Things have barely improved this year. His qualifying deficit is a still enormous 0.485 seconds — although that’s only 0.05 seconds worse than Lance Stroll’s gap to Fernando Alonso — and he’s still yet to beat his teammate in any competitive session.
He was told at the start of the year he’d have to be the surprise of the season to keep his seat. Whispers are growing stronger that he could lose his seat as early as the second half of the season.
If he were to be axed early, the prevailing rumour is that Mercedes junior Andrea Kimi Antonelli could get the nod to take over.
Antonelli will be 18 years old — the minimum age to enter F1 — on the Sunday of the Dutch Grand Prix, the first race after the mid-season break. That could suggested a debut at his home Italian Grand Prix the following weekend.
If Mercedes were to succeed in luring Max Verstappen with its reported $245 million bank-breaking offer, Antonelli would presumably stay at Williams for the medium term to get himself up to speed, as George Russell did in 2019–21.
Otherwise Antonelli is tipped to sensationally move directly into the works Mercedes drive for 2025, freeing up the Williams seat.
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Availability at Williams would be a key pressure release valve for the sport’s three other at-risk racers scrambling for job security.
Zhou Guanyu is facing the end of the line for his short F1 career just weeks after fulfilling his childhood dream of racing at his home Chinese Grand Prix.
Zhou has proven himself a capable performer, but his timing has been unfortunate. By the time he’d got up to speed in his debut 2022 season, Sauber’s strong early form was already tailing off, and the team has been on the slide ever since. In his most competitive days he’s never had a less competitive car.
That sad truth has left him with arguably the least forceful sales pitch of any driver likely to be pushed from their seat.
Bottas has a stronger CV that combines experience with success and a long stint with one of the sport’s grandee teams.
Williams would probably be interested if he could offer the team a long-term undertaking.
Haas might also make an offer. Though team boss Komatsu has talked highly of Magnussen’s renewed zeal this season, Bottas would represent a step forward in outright speed, though he’s much less of an elbows-out fighter. Bottas also has a higher profile.
That could in turn put Magnussen at risk of being without a seat when the music stops. Again, Williams might be his salvation, particularly if it can’t get any long-term guarantees out of Albon, who appears almost certain to seek a seat higher up the grid when his contract is up at the end of 2025.
That leaves only Alpine as a potential question mark. If Sainz were to rebuff Audi, Ocon could find himself Hinwil-bound in search of long-term stability.
In that case the door might finally creak open for the team’s reserve drive Jack Doohan.
Doohan is undertaking much the same reserve program Oscar Piastri had been embarking on before his sudden switch to McLaren ahead of his 2023 debut.
As he outlined to Fox Sports, he’s at every grand prix with Alpine. For the European races he’ll also be at the simulator undertaking parallel testing with the race team. During the week he’s racking up 5000 kilometres of testing in previous cars. He’ll also appear in at least two FP1 sessions later this season.
An opening at Alpine — or, failing that, possibly at Williams — is exactly what the Aussie needs to break into the top tier.
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WHAT ABOUT RB?
Red Bull’s second team has been largely shielded from the broader driver market speculation because it’s effectively a closed shop, with all possibilities already accounted for.
If Daniel Ricciardo is deemed surplus to requirements or turns his season around and wins promotion to Red Bull Racing, Liam Lawson is standing by to take his seat. The same goes for Tsunoda, though a fifth year with RB is firming for the Japanese ace.
With Pérez performing well so far and Max Verstappen under contract, un unchanged line-up appears most likely, though Sainz wants to keep himself in the frame.
If both teams keep steady rosters next season — still a live possibility — Lawson would be let go as a free agent.
Williams would surely be interested in his services, with rumours last year that it had been open to taking him on loan this year but only if it could keep the Kiwi for multiple seasons.
Hülkenberg and Audi have got the market moving, but the permutations are still almost endless in settling the 2025 grid.