2023 Hungarian Grand Prix Recap
Verstappen takes the checkered flag Credit: Getty Images
Max Verstappen
Lando Norris +33.731
Sergio Perez +37.603
Lewis Hamilton +39.134
Oscar Piastri +62.572
George Russell +65.825
Charles Leclerc +70.317
Carlos Sainz +71.073
Fernando Alonso +75.709
Lance Stroll +1 Lap
Alex Albon +1 Lap
Valtteri Bottas +1 Lap
Daniel Ricciardo + 1 Lap
Nico Hulkenberg +1 Lap
Yuki Tsunoda +1 Lap
Zhou Guanyu +1 Lap
Kevin Magnussen +1 Lap
Logan Sargeant DNF
Esteban Ocon DNF
Pierre Gasly DNF
In round 12 of the Hungarian Grand Prix, Red Bull take a record 12th straight win and it is 7 straight wins for Max Verstappen. A lot of excitement heading into the weekend and the race. Prior to the weekend, Alpha Tauri fired Nyck De Vries and Daniel Ricciardo made his return to F1. Ricciardo was the test driver for Red Bull after losing his seat at McLaren at the end of last year and during the test sessions after the British Gran Prix, Ricciardo impressed so much that they immediately fired De Vries, who had struggled in the first half of the season, and promoted Ricciardo to the seat with the “back up” Red Bull team, also known as Alpha Tauri. A little harsh on De Vries to lose his seat only halfway into his first F1 season, but that’s the way Red Bull have always operated so not a surprise at all.
Daniel Ricciardo back with Alpha Tauri Credit:Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto
Moving on to the race weekend, it was quite hectic as we saw Mercedes lead the way in the first and last practice sessions, Ferrari lead the way in the 2nd practice session, and Lewis Hamilton coming out of nowhere to grab the pole for the race. While Lewis was able to go first in qualifying, his teammate George Russell continued his qualifying struggles and couldn’t get out of Q1 and qualified 18th. Also in qualifying Sergio Perez ended his streak of Q1 and Q2 exits and made it into Q3 but still only qualified a disappointing 9th. Verstappen qualified 2nd with both of the McLarens qualifying 3rd and 4th. There was a lot of excitement heading into the race as it was the first time all year that Red Bull were not able to be on pole and with Red Bull having brought upgrades this weekend, we were all wondering if they had got the upgrades all wrong. Verstappen who has struggled on starts all season it seems, actually got a good jump against Hamilton to start the race. Hamilton tried to squeeze Verstappen to the inside but Verstappen had already got position, then made sure he drove wide into turn 1. Verstappen jumped out to the lead after 1 turn and Hamilton dropped all the way back to 4th. It was about as bad of a start that Hamilton could’ve had, other than wrecking out of the race.
From there, Verstappen took charge of the race, like he has all season, and put to rest any of the doubts people had about the Red Bull upgrades negatively impacting the car. Piastri spent the first part of the race in 2nd after jumping two places in the first turn, followed by his teammate Lando Norris in 3rd and Hamilton in 4th. Norris jumped his teammate as the first round of pit stops came around and some may have questioned McLaren showing preference to Norris with the first pit stop but considering how the rest of the race went, I’d say they made the right call. The big movers on the day were George Russell and Sergio Perez. Russell started 18th and made his way up to 6th, while Perez started 9th and made his way up to 3rd for a podium. Towards the end of the race there was some excitement as Perez was chasing down Norris for 2nd place and Hamilton chased down Piastri with about 12 laps to go and passed him and somehow finished about 24 seconds ahead of him. The Mercedes car was really fast at the end of the race when it had low fuel, which also explains the qualifying success. After passing Piastri, Hamilton looked to have no shot at getting close to Perez but towards the final few laps, he drastically cut into Perez’s gap and came up just a few laps short of a podium.
In the end, Verstappen led all 70 laps and cruised to the biggest margin of victory of the season. Which is crazy to say considering the doubts people had of Red Bull going into this race, but then again Red Bull have had some gaps this season that were just as big and they pit Verstappen to simply go for a fastest lap.
3 Star Drivers of the Day
3rd Star - Lando Norris
Back to back 2nd place finishes for Lando Norris and McLaren out of nowhere. The first few races of the season and they were arguably the worst team on the grid and now this after their upgrades is quite the turn around. Lando qualified 3rd, got around Hamilton on the start but stayed 3rd when Piastri got around him on the inside, then Norris made his way around Piastri and ended up being much faster than his teammate in the race and lastly held off a charging Sergio Perez at the end of the race. I’d love to see Norris pick up his first career win at some point this season and after the last two races, it seems like a possibility with McLaren being the 2nd best team on the grid.
2nd Star - George Russell
Another dreadful qualifying performance by George Russell but yet again he continues to be very good in the actual race. It’s shocking that qualifying is where Russell seemed to excel last season and Hungary is actually where he got his first pole last year, yet this he can hardly make Q3. Russell taking the car from 18th to 6th and getting around both of the Ferraris, with Leclerc’s time penalty, is quite the race performance especially at a track that is not the easiest to pass on.
1st Star - Max Verstappen
Arguably the first time all season that Red Bull and Verstappen had faced some adversity and how did he respond? By winning the race by the largest margin all season. As I mentioned earlier, if there has been one thing that Verstappen has struggled with this season, it would be his starts. Verstappen has been kind of average on starts but today he absolutely nailed the start to get around Hamilton. It was also a nice and probably calculated move to push Hamilton just wide enough in the first turn, that a McLaren or two would get around him as well. Great race by Verstappen. He may not have gotten the pole but he led every lap, got the fastest lap and won the race to take his championship lead up to a staggering 110 pts.
Other Notes:
This week in Ferrari being Ferrari, Charles Leclerc has a horrible 9 second pit stop, granted not his fault but the teams. Then to make matters worse, Leclerc gets hit with a 5 second penalty for speeding on the pit lane, which was his fault. Leclerc finished 7th due to George Russell jumping him after the 5 second time penalty. Despite a Mercedes car starting 18th, Ferrari still can’t finish above them. Imagine the shock if you would’ve have told someone before the season that Charles Leclerc would have 80 pts through 11 races and would be behind his teammate Carlos Sainz.
It continues to get worse for Alpine. Alpine have had a lot of bad luck this season and have been denied quite a few points by the bad luck. And while there is no guarantee that they would have scored points today with their drivers starting 12th and 15th, it still quite unfortunate to have both cars taken out of the race in the first turn of lap 1. In essentially 2 weeks, McLaren have doubled Alpine’s points total on the season.
Also how about Lando Norris just breaking Max Verstappen’s trophy and hardly acknowledging it lol
Standings
Max Verstappen 281 pts
Sergio Perez 171 pts
Fernando Alonso 139 pts
Lewis Hamilton 133 pts
George Russell 90 pts
Carlos Sainz 87 pts
Charles Leclerc 80 pts
Lando Norris 60 pts
Lance Stroll 45 pts
Esteban Ocon 31 pts
We are back next weekend with the last race before the summer break with F1 in Belgium. Spa-Francorchamps is on of the best tracks on the schedule so despite Red Bull more than likely dominating, should be a great race.