- Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg delivered impressively measured drives to finish just outside the top 10 in demanding conditions
- Audi Revolut F1 Team established itself as one of the weekend’s consistently fast squads on a traditionally challenging circuit
- Development driver Freddie Slater fought brilliantly for victory to secure another podium finish and boost his championship campaign
The Audi Revolut F1 Team delivered a highly competitive and resilient performance under the Spielberg sunshine, maximising every opportunity at a demanding Austrian Grand Prix.
In hot and punishing track conditions, Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg executed flawless, consistent races to finish just on the doorstep of the top 10. The team operated at an elevated level throughout the Grand Prix, extracting the absolute limit of pace from the package and ensuring no performance was left in the pit garages.
On a circuit initially predicted to test the team’s weaknesses, this weekend’s showing credibly established the Audi Revolut F1 Team as one of the consistently quick outfits on the grid. While the final positions just missed out on points rewards, the collective step forward serves as a major confidence boost heading into the dense summer racing schedule.
Adding to the weekend’s success, Audi Development Programme driver Freddie Slater starred in the FIA Formula 3 feature race earlier in the day. The young Briton fought aggressively at the very front of the field for the race victory, ultimately crossing the line to claim a superb third-place podium finish and keep his championship ambitions firmly on track.
There is no time to rest as the momentum builds. The Audi Revolut F1 Team and Freddie Slater will return to the track next weekend as the paddock travels to the historic birthplace of motorsport for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone.
Allan McNish, Racing Director: “Overall, this weekend represents another important step forward for us as a team. I think we maximised the performance of the car across both qualifying and the race, and Nico and Gabi extracted everything that was available from our package.
“Around this circuit we simply didn’t quite have the qualifying performance to get ahead of the VCARBs yesterday, with the track characteristics not playing particularly well to our strengths at the moment, and today we couldn’t close that gap any further. That said, from an operational perspective it was an excellent weekend. The drivers, engineers and mechanics all executed well, the pit stops were strong, and everything worked exactly as we wanted it to.
“We leave Austria encouraged by the progress we have made and with another solid step in our development. Now the focus shifts to Silverstone, where we will look to continue building on that momentum.”
Nico Hülkenberg (Car 27): “It was a difficult race to make much progress. We tried to create an advantage by extending the first stint, but with the amount of traffic and cars coming through to lap us, it didn’t really play out the way we had hoped. Looking back, maybe an earlier stop would have opened a few more opportunities, but that’s easy to say afterwards.
“The positive is that our race pace was quite good. We were able to match, and at times even be a little quicker than, the cars around us, but starting further back made it difficult to convert that into a result.
“We’ll take the learnings into Silverstone. It’s a very different circuit and one I always enjoy, so hopefully we can put ourselves in a stronger position next weekend.”
Gabriel Bortoleto (Car 5): “I think we did the best we could today. I overtook the Alpine ahead of me, and we had decent pace for most of the race, but I just couldn’t make it into the points as the VCARBs were just faster than us this weekend. It was a very clean race as well, so there wasn’t really any chaos or retirements ahead to take advantage of.
“Overall, we maximised everything we had this weekend. Our pace in qualifying was good, and the package we brought here worked as we expected. We just need to catch up a little bit to those ahead of us, and we’ll do our best to get there – starting with Silverstone next week.”
