Days after claiming his second win of the season in the British Grand Prix, Nico Rosberg is aiming to complete a perfect set of three ‘home’ wins when he leads the Mercedes team into the German Grand Prix.
Rosberg grew up and lives in Monaco. Silverstone is barely 15km from his outfit’s Brackley base and Nurburgring is in the Mercedes team’s motherland Germany.
“We are fast and we are setting the pace and we are growing into the role of being favourites for the races now,” said Rosberg.
“It would be so fantastic if I can win again to complete a hat-trick of three wins on my home circuits.”
Rosberg won the British Grand Prix after a spectacular tyre failure blew Mercedes teammate Briton Lewis Hamilton out of the lead in a race he had dominated from the start.
Three other drivers also suffered major tyre blowouts. Some threatened to strike unless the sport made immediate changes to the low-wear, low-durability Pirelli tyres that had failed.
Pirelli announced this week that they will be changing the tyre construction from steel to Kevlar for the race at Nurburgring.
The change quelled much of the post-Silverstone unrest which had managed to hide the progress made by Mercedes in moving up to second behind champions Red Bull in the constructors championship.
Mercedes have won two and taken pole position in five of the eight events so far this year. Red Bull have three wins.
The modern Nurburgring was opened in 1984 and, though it does not present quite the challenge of the old and revered circuit, it does offer a stern examination of car and driver.
It demands a compromise in set-up rather than the high-speed approach used at Silverstone and produces a race often run in entirely unpredictable weather.
That may help Rosberg and Mercedes as they bid to overhaul Red Bull and defending triple world champion driver Sebastian Vettel, who has yet to win in his native Germany.
Last week he failed to finish in the points for the first time in 15 races, a setback that will add to his determination to recover and beat Rosberg, Hamilton and Ferrari’s two-time champion Spaniard Fernando Alonso in round nine of this year’s 19-race championship.