Nico Hulkenberg has started seven Azerbaijan Grand Prix races and scored in none of them. Not a single point in seven visits, which makes Baku the most stubbornly unhelpful circuit on his calendar.
His best finish here is eleventh, and he has now done it twice. One place, and one position's worth of luck, from breaking the run.
Two accidents, a four year gap and one near miss
The first two attempts did not survive to the end. Thirteenth on the grid in 2017 became an accident and a classified seventeenth. Fourteenth on the grid in 2018 became another accident and an eighteenth. Two visits, two cars in the barriers, no laps that mattered.
2019 at least reached the flag. Fifteenth on the grid, fourteenth at the finish, a lap down. Progress of a sort, and still nothing on the board.
Then a four year gap between Baku starts, and a return in 2023 with Haas that began with twentieth on the grid and ended seventeenth. The car was not the problem that weekend so much as the Saturday was.
2024 is the one that genuinely got away. Twelfth on the grid, eleventh at the flag, the closest he has come at this circuit. One place outside the points, and the first name on the sheet to get nothing.
2025 with Sauber was a seventeenth-place start and a sixteenth-place finish. Then 2026 with Audi produced the cruellest version yet: eighteenth on the grid, eleventh at the flag, first car outside the points for the second time in three years. The streak reached seven.
Nico Hulkenberg's Azerbaijan GP record year by year
Every Azerbaijan Grand Prix start, with the grid slot it came from and what it was worth.
| Season | Grid | Finish | Points | Team |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 13 | P17 | 0 | Renault |
| 2018 | 14 | P18 | 0 | Renault |
| 2019 | 15 | P14 | 0 | Renault |
| 2023 | 20 | P17 | 0 | Haas F1 Team |
| 2024 | 12 | P11 | 0 | Haas F1 Team |
| 2025 | 17 | P16 | 0 | Sauber |
| 2026 | 18 | P11 | 0 | Audi |
The grid slot has never helped
He has never started a Baku race higher than twelfth. That is the cleanest explanation for the zero: the Baku City Circuit punishes a bad Saturday harder than most, and he has not had a good one here. His average starting position across the six is a little over fifteenth.
2026 was the closest thing to a change of circumstances he has had here, arriving in the R26 with points already on the board that season, and it still ended the same way. Seven starts, seven blanks, and two of them finishing eleventh. The run has now lasted since 2017.
