Mercedes former team boss, Ross Brawn revealed on his post-race column that Nico Hulkenberg was Mercedes’ “second choice” behind Hamilton for their 2013 season.

This was brought up after Silverstone’s 70th anniversary in 2020. Where the German driver proved his Formula One capabilities when he took over for Sergio Perez, after the Mexican driver tested positive for COVID-19. Hulkenberg qualified third, and ran fifth for most of the race when a late pit-stop pushed him down to seventh.

When asked if Hulkenberg was disappointed with the results, he responded with “Well it’s not ideal,” then continued to talk about his struggles within the third stint, “so we just need to see what happened. But given the circumstances, I’m very happy to be standing here with six points to be honest.”

Lewis Hamilton took the place of seven-time world championship winner, Michael Schumacher. Who hadn’t yet decided if he was done with racing, after being offered another three years with Mercedes. But when Schumacher found out about the talks with Hamilton, he announced his retirement.

This is when Hulkenberg comes into play. As Hamilton had not yet decided whether or not to leave McLaren. The Mercedes team started to consider a back up if Hamilton decided to stay, that was Hulkenberg. Ross Brawn mentioned in his post-race column that he “always respected Nico enormously as a driver.” and that he is “a strong driver who should be in Formula One.”

It turned out that Hamilton did take Schumacher’s place for the 2013 season; and was gifted handsomely for it. Winning the world championship seven times to ties with the very man he took the seat of. Before later moving to Ferrari.