Nico Hulkenberg had no answers for his lack of pace at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The German would only qualify ahead of the two Williams' on Saturday and finished a second slower than teammate Daniel Ricciardo.

In the race, he would only move one place forward from his eventual starting upto 14th, meaning his P7 in Australia remains his only points to date.

"It didn’t go very well, obviously. No pace whatsoever, really slow. But I don’t have the fix or the key for it," he told Motorsport.com.

"I felt I was giving it my best effort and was driving it pretty hard and well, but if you see the pace of others and mine, it was going nowhere."

While Renault was expected to struggle on Baku's straights, Hulkenberg admitted the problems were deeper than that.

"I’m not sure what happened this weekend, it’s been a bit like that since lap one. Maybe it’s just one of those mysterious weekends, which I hope [it is], but I felt like I had no weapons in the race," he explained.

“It’s one of 21 weekends. Of course, it didn’t really go well, a bit better on Daniel’s side, but we’ll regroup and go again in Barcelona.”

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Renault boss Cyril Abiteboul is also hoping the return to Europe can turnaround the team's fortunes, with only 12 points so far leaving them seventh in the Constructors' Championship.

“Very clearly, Azerbaijan was a bad weekend,” he was quoted by Motorsport Week. “From FP1 onwards we never found our pace despite big changes to the car overnight.

“Overall, the first stint of the season has been disappointing, but if we manage to get all things in order we can have a decent competitiveness level as demonstrated on several occasions.

“We must absolutely see the start of the European season as an opportunity to reset.”