Aston Martin announced on Thursday morning that four-time world champion Vettel had tested positive for Covid-19, ruling him out of this weekend’s Bahrain season-opener.
It prompted the team to turn to reserve driver Hulkenberg to stand in for the weekend, giving him an unexpected return to F1 after more than 18 months on the sidelines.
Hulkenberg last raced full-time in 2019 with Renault, but made three substitute appearances for Aston Martin’s predecessor, Racing Point, in 2020 after Sergio Perez and Lance Stroll missed races due to Covid-19.
Hulkenberg revealed he “got called out of bed” with news he would be racing this weekend before packing his bag and making the trip to Bahrain.
“It’s obviously a bit of an interesting situation again,” Hulkenberg said.
“I’m just going to take it lap by lap, session by session. I haven’t been in a car for five or six days [of testing] so [it will] probably take a few laps to get some of the rust off me.
“We’ll just take it…
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