@Max33Verstappen recovers from tenth to clinch #HungarianGP victory. #F1

Verstappen Hungarian GP victory – Red Bull’s Max Verstappen recovered from tenth to claim his 28^th career-victory at the Hungarian GP as Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton and George Russell completed the top three whilst Ferrari threw away a win with further questionable strategy calls.

 

 

The reigning world champion overcame his loss of power in qualifying and a spin thanks to solid tyre management to complete his rise from 10^th to victory to extend his Driver’s Championship lead to 80 points.

 

Hamilton lead the Silver Arrows home to a two-three finish over pole-sitter Russell, who lead for 30 tours, as front-row starting Ferrari of Carlos Sainz slipped to fifth over Red Bull’s recovering Sergio Perez.

 

Meanwhile, early leader Charles Leclerc was the only front-runner to make three pit-stops and be passed twice by Verstappen and fell to sixth place.

 

Russell was put on a set of scrub C4 red side-walled softer compounds to launch on a dry Hungaroring, the spots of rain were falling in the build-up to the Grand Prix failing to develop into a full-on rain band.

 

When the 70-lap Hungarian Grand Prix began, thanks to the grippier rubber, pole-sitter Russell launched solidly to pull across and eventually cover the medium tyre-fitted F1-75 threat into the opening corner and held P1.

 

Sainz tried to force his way around the outside on the right-hander before the F1 W13 racer cut back at the apex, with the Prancing Horse keeping in formation as Leclerc slid into third.

 

Hamilton got a great getaway to fly by both Alpine F1 Team A522 entries for fifth behind soft-starting McLaren of Lando Norris, as Verstappen pushed his RB18 racer around the outside of Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas and McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo to quickly take eighth place after his loss of power late in Q3.

 

Russell crossed the line at the end of lap one with a 1.6 second gap over Sainz.

 

After a fast virtual safety car deployment for Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel being nipped with Williams Racing’s Alexander Albon, Russell gained another second over the chasing Ferrari next time round with Leclerc 1.5 seconds further adrift.

 

It took until the 14^th tour for the red-marked softer tyres to show signs of degradation for the F1 W13 racer as Sainz cut a 0.6 second gap out of Russell, the leading Ferrari showing enough pace to stop the pit-wall from swapping the order with Leclerc putting pressure on his team-mate.

 

With both F1-75 entries nose-to-tail, it looked as though they’d be split when Sainz was told to pit at the end of the 16^th lap but remained out as Russell went in for his initial pit-stop.

 

The Mercedes driver slowly switched to the C4 yellow-branded mediums after a right-front tyre delay to come out side-by-side with the Alpine of Fernando Alonso, cutting back through turn two and three to grab sixth.

 

A lap later Leclerc reacted, Sainz brought in to release Leclerc, but the Spaniard too was delayed with a 3.7 second stop to crucially come out behind the A522 racer of Alonso.

 

This lead Leclerc to lead the race by 11 seconds over Hamilton before the Brackley-based outfit was brought in on the 20^th tour.

 

Russell was therefore release in second place but 19 seconds behind to race-leader Leclerc.

 

As the lap counter reached the high-teens, Leclerc’s pace was dropping. The Monegasque driver pitted at the end of the 21^st tour for a set of mediums in 2.9 seconds to promoted Russell into third place.

 

The first-time pole-sitter had a 2.6 second buffer over the chasing Leclerc as Sainz sat a further one second behind whilst World Driver’s Championship leader Verstappen took fourth place and a further 3.5 seconds’ off.

 

With Ferrari suited to the Hungaroring all weekend, Leclerc soon gained DRS assistance to bring the lead down and bring him right behind the Mercedes gearbox.

 

Russell was forced to defend his position, pushing the F1-75 racer to the outside line wherever possible to maximise the distance Leclerc had to travel at the difficult-to-overtake Budapest track.

 

Then on the 31^st tour, Leclerc made it stick, as Russell moved to the inside line into the opening corner to cover off the Ferrari but with DRS it was tightly squeezed into the turn one braking zone to take first place.

 

Leclerc pulled out a rapid seven-tenths on the F1 W13 and double that gap over the rest of the tour, to advantage rising to 2.8 seconds with Russell and Verstappen third and fourth respectively.

 

Verstappen made a crucial pit-stop on the 39^th lap for medium rubber and despite sparks flying from the right-rear corner, he had a swift 2.4 second stop – encouraged with the message “there’s still a long way to go.”

 

Verstappen emerged in sixth place as Russell made a second stop for mediums the next tour, whilst Leclerc then pitted for the poor-performing C2 white-branded harder tyres.

 

The Red Bull RB18 entries, having passed Russell, the Ferrari returned in third place behind Hamilton and Sainz on the slowest available rubber and struggled to get heat in them leading the Monegasque-driver vulnerable.

 

Verstappen had DRS assistance on Leclerc into turn one to pass the Ferrari, the Dutchman acutely opened his steering a fraction at the apex to force Leclerc to have a compromised line.

 

Getting back on the power, the F1-75 racer stepped out of line to let Verstappen pull away.

 

But Leclerc was given another chance, despite blasting the status of his harder rubber. Verstappen tried to get on the power out of the second-to-last corner but lit up the rears and spun.

 

The Dutchman caught his RB18 racer in 360 degrees, but not before the Ferrari had flew back past, even if Perez limited the damage by blocking Russell and remaining behind his team-mate.

 

But on the 43^rd tour, Verstappen was back within a second of title-rival Leclerc and the Dutchman cut his RB18 back through the second corner to reclaim the position down the hill into the third corner.

 

Ferrari brought Sainz in three tours later to give up the lead and endured a slow left-rear change onto softs meaning he was held to a 4.6 second stop to give Hamilton a 6.4 gap to Verstappen.

 

Verstappen finally made his second pit-stop on the end of the 51^st tour for a switch to the softer compounds and emerged in fifth, 10 seconds behind Sainz as Russell passed Leclerc – still struggling on the harder tyres.

 

The F1-75 entry went loose through the final corner to give Russell an easy run for second place over the line as Ferrari eventually abandoned its strategy and was forced into another stop.

 

The softer compounds were put on but having lead, he emerged over 30 seconds behind Verstappen.

 

With the Dutchman managing the mediums to the flag, including a late virtual safety car deployment for Bottas coming to a halt due to a power loss onboard his Alfa Romeo at turn 12, he claimed an unlikely victory by 7.834 seconds.

 

The Mercedes were the next quickest cars in the closing stages of the Grand Prix, with soft tyre-running Hamilton able to pass Sainz on older rubber and then team-mate Hamilton for second place.

 

Despite complaining that his tyres went off, Russell too had the pace over Sainz to score consecutive 2-3 finishes for the Silver Arrows as Perez inflicted more pain on the Scuderia in fifth place.

 

Leclerc’s pit-stop made him come home sixth and in-front of Norris, who swapped to the harder compounds to remain ahead of Alpine pairing Alonso and Ocon.

 

Vettel recovered from the early tangle with Albon to take the final point’s place in the updated Aston Martin AMR22 racer, in-front of team-mate Lance Stroll, the Canadian having been turned around by the McLaren of Ricciardo – the Australian slapped with a five second-time penalty.

 

AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly finished 12^th from a pit-lane start after passing the exceeded engine allocation limit with a post-qualifying power-unit change.

 

Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN’s Zhou Guanyu was 13^th and ahead of Haas F1 Team’s Mick Schumacher who took 14^th and the penalty-hit Ricciardo 15th, whilst Kevin Magnussen placed 16^th in the other VF-22 entry.

 

Williams’ Albon landed in 17^th in-front of team-mate and FP3 time-sheet topper Nicholas Latifi who ended the Grand Prix 18^th.

 

Scuderia AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda completed the finishers after suffering a spin from 17^th to the rear through the turns six and seven chicane, as Bottas was the sole-driver to retire in the final race the sport takes it’s summer-break.

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2022 Hungarian GP – The Top Three

 

 

2022 Hungarian GP Winner – Max Verstappen, #1, Oracle Red Bull Racing-RBPT, RB18:

“I was hoping I could get close to a podium, but we had a really good strategy, we were really reactive. Even with the 360, we won the race! I was battling a lot of guys; it was a lot of fun out there. Crazy race, very happy we won it.”

 

2^nd Place – Lewis Hamilton, #44, Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, F1 W13 E Performance:

“I was definitely struggling at the beginning, but bit by bit I got more comfortable with the balance. Got a really good start at well. The other guys have an edge, but we are clearly closing the gap, hopefully we can bring some more into the second half of the season and start fighting with them. I was hoping for rain at the end to challenge Max. If the DRS had been okay yesterday, we’d have been in [fight] for the win.”

 

3^rd Place – George Russell, #63, Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, F1 W13 E Performance:

“Strong start, good first stint but at the end on the mediums with the rain, it was difficult. We are definitely making progress. We pitted early on both stints, so you are trying to eke the tyres out, difficult position to be in.”

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Formula 1 Aramco Hungarian Grand Prix 2022 Race Results Classification (70 Laps)

POS	NO	DRIVER	CAR	LAPS	TIME/RETIRED	PTS
1	1	Max Verstappen	RED BULL RACING RBPT	70	1:39:35.912	25
2	44	Lewis Hamilton	MERCEDES	70	+7.834s	19
3	63	George Russell	MERCEDES	70	+12.337s	15
4	55	Carlos Sainz	FERRARI	70	+14.579s	12
5	11	Sergio Perez	RED BULL RACING RBPT	70	+15.688s	10
6	16	Charles Leclerc	FERRARI	70	+16.047s	8
7	4	Lando Norris	MCLAREN MERCEDES	70	+78.300s	6
8	14	Fernando Alonso	ALPINE RENAULT	69	+1 lap	4
9	31	Esteban Ocon	ALPINE RENAULT	69	+1 lap	2
10	5	Sebastian Vettel	ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES	69	+1 lap	1
11	18	Lance Stroll	ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES	69	+1 lap	0
12	10	Pierre Gasly	ALPHATAURI RBPT	69	+1 lap	0
13	24	Zhou Guanyu	ALFA ROMEO FERRARI	69	+1 lap	0
14	47	Mick Schumacher	HAAS FERRARI	69	+1 lap	0
15	3	Daniel Ricciardo	MCLAREN MERCEDES	69	+1 lap	0
16	20	Kevin Magnussen	HAAS FERRARI	69	+1 lap	0
17	23	Alexander Albon	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	69	+1 lap	0
18	6	Nicholas Latifi	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	69	+1 lap	0
19	22	Yuki Tsunoda	ALPHATAURI RBPT	68	+2 laps	0
20	77	Valtteri Bottas	ALFA ROMEO FERRARI	65	DNF	0

* Provisional results. Note – Hamilton scored an additional point for setting the fastest lap of the race.

https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2022/races/1117/hungary/race-result.html

 

Click here for the 2022 Formula 1 World Driver’s (Top 10) and Constructors Championship Standings.

 

Round 14 of the 2022 FIA Formula One World Championship returns to the legendary Circuit De Spa-Francorchamps in a month’s time for the Formula 1 Rolex Belgian Grand Prix 2022 from Friday August 26-Sunday August 28.