{"id":82362,"date":"2025-08-20T11:59:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T11:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/82362\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T11:59:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T11:59:07","slug":"helmut-marko-red-bull-nearly-signed-nico-hulkenberg-in-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/82362\/","title":{"rendered":"Helmut Marko: Red Bull nearly signed Nico Hulkenberg in 2021"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nico Hulkenberg<\/a> narrowly missed out on being Max Verstappen<\/a>‘s teammate in 2021, according to Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko.<\/p>\n

Red Bull signed Sergio P\u00e9rez<\/a> for what turned out to be Verstappen’s maiden championship season on the back of his breakout victory at the 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

The team had been looking to move on from Alex Albon<\/a> at the time and had been impressed by Hulkenberg’s appearances that season as a Covid-19 super-sub.<\/p>\n

Marko said Perez’s victory at the penultimate race of the season changed everything.<\/p>\n

“At that time he [Hulkenberg] was, I think, a co-commentator at Servus TV, so there was already a relationship there, and there were the beginnings of talks,” Marko told F1 Insider.<\/p>\n

Max Verstappen and Nico Hulkenberg have a good relationship on and off the track.\u00a0MOHD RASFAN\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n

“But then P\u00e9rez won that race in Bahrain, I think, and because of that everything turned in P\u00e9rez’s direction.”<\/p>\n

P\u00e9rez’s tenure at Red Bull lasted until last season, when he was dropped amid spiralling results, although he did claim five victories for the team across four seasons.<\/p>\n

– Sainz, Alonso hail Hulkenberg as one of F1’s best<\/a>
– F1 ‘healthier’ without Horner, says McLaren boss<\/a>
– Verstappen on 2026: Time to stop the rumours<\/a><\/p>\n

Hulkenberg eventually returned to F1 from a stint on the sidelines, first with Haas and then with Sauber this season.<\/p>\n

Hulkenberg, who has a good relationship with four-time champion Verstappen, scored a popular first podium at the British Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

Marko suggested signing Hulkenberg over P\u00e9rez might have been a better outcome for Red Bull, as it has struggled to find consistent results in the other car.<\/p>\n

“I think it would have been a really nice time, because the two get along very well, and yes, Hulkenberg is a safe bank for points, and in our car it would also have been top positions,” Marko added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nico Hulkenberg narrowly missed out on being Max Verstappen‘s teammate in 2021, according to Red Bull advisor Helmut…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":82363,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-82362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}