“A race like this is frustrating and we need to get better as a whole,” he said. Leclerc was as perplexed as the rest of us as to why the team chose the hard tyres and bemoaned Ferrari’s failings. Ferrari were forced to pit him again for soft tyres but the damage was done and he emerged in sixth, from which he could not come back. The exasperation emanating from Leclerc’s cockpit danced in the air like heat haze. Then Russell also found him a sitting duck. First Verstappen shot past, spun with a clutch issue, before breezing by him again. Those in his wake had stuck with the faster, medium tyres and he was eaten up in no short order. On his second stop they fitted the slowest, hard tyres for Leclerc, so he could make it to the end without another stop, expecting the rubber to come up to speed with track time. So far so good, the win, it seemed, was in his grasp – yet his team floundered once more. It started promisingly, their pace self-evident and after the first pit stops Leclerc took the lead with a bold move, late‑braking round the outside of Russell at turn one. Sainz and Leclerc had started in second and third, the race surely theirs to dictate. Control, calm and class at the very front then but, behind, a baffling chaos from Ferrari. There was also, in common with Red Bull, well-managed decision making on the pit wall. This is the first time we have been able to battle with Ferrari. “If we can take this pace into the second half of the season we can start to fight.
“This weekend there was potential for a win,” he said.
Max Verstappen had started 10th on the grid but ended up winning by almost eight seconds. Hamilton believes a victory is genuinely achievable. On Saturday they found the sweet spot as Russell took pole and on Sunday the car was quicker and more manageable than it has been all year. This weekend, right up until qualifying, it had been guarding its performance with petulant devilry. Their car, a mercurial beast this year, is a handful to set up, balance and put into the operating window. Enough indeed for Hamilton to move from seventh to second and for him and teammate Russell in third, to finish ahead of both Ferraris and Sergio Pérez’s Red Bull, which was fifth. They scored a second and third last time out in France but here they did it with their car proving it could genuinely challenge.
F1 STANDINGS DRIVER
Verstappen’s lead over the Monégasque driver is now a chasm of 80 points, a seemingly insurmountable advantage with nine races remaining.Īt Mercedes, while a win remains a way off, the pleasure from this was palpable. It was a body blow to Leclerc’s championship hopes. Verstappen threw in a spin mid‑race, to lose a place to Leclerc he had just taken, only to settle and pass him once more, before marching down the road to take his eighth win of the season from 13 meetings. The Dutchman had to make repeated passes but he is so confident, so dominant now, he seemed to almost be toying with the opposition, Leclerc the luckless mouse, allowed out of range of his claws but only for seconds. We had a few overtakes, we pitted at the right time and put the right tyres on the car.
“We had to remain calm and we made all the right calls. So much so the world champion was even moved to reference the inexplicable decision that had cost Ferrari so dearly. Verstappen’s touch and judgment in coming through the field was unquestionable and Red Bull’s race management and strategy calls were executed to perfection. Mercedes in turn produced their best performance of the year, while in stark contrast Ferrari wallowed, from leading the race to fourth and sixth for Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc. What had begun with the expectation of damage limitation led to an immense run from 10th on the grid as he and his Red Bull team pulled off an absolute coup. On an afternoon of gripping turnarounds, Hungary was significant on several levels.
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