Hungarian GP : Post-Friday reaction from Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas

With a win at 2021 British Grand Prix, Mercedes AMG F1 team put an end to Red Bull’s recent domination. But they would like to carry the positive momentum into the summer break by winning 2021 Hungarian Grand Prix.

The Seven-time World Champions off to a good start at Hungaroring with 1-2 finish in Friday FP2 practice session.

Vallteri Bottas led Mercedes in morning FP1 session by finishing in P2 with a fastest lap time 1:17.616, +0.061s down on Verstappen’s session leading time. The Fin completed 26 laps, while his teammate Lewis Hamilton managed to do 25 laps, with a fastest lap time of 1:17.722, +0.167s down on Max time.

In the hot afternoon session, Mercedes up their game to finish 1-2 in the final classification. Once again it was Valtteri who led the team by completing 29 laps with a fastest time of 1:17.012.

Lewis managed to complete 27 laps with fastest lap time of 1:17.039, which is +0.027s shy of his team mates time.

Overall it’s a solid day for Mercedes at the track where they have become a dominant force in the recent years.

Will it be a Mercedes pole tomorrow or Max & Red Bull have different ideas ?

Lewis Hamilton

“It was roasting today, I’ve probably lost 3kg out there and the tyres were melting! To see Valtteri and I at the top of the timesheets this afternoon is pleasing, it’s great for the team and we’ll only improve on that. We have some work to do tonight to see how we can finesse the car some more.

You can’t plan for the rain, it’s so unpredictable so you just try and get the car in the best place, understand the tyres, and set the car up for a dry Qualifying and if it rains, it rains. I’m optimistic because I definitely think we can improve the car balance-wise and if we can do that, we should be there ready to fight tomorrow and for the race on Sunday.”

Valtteri Bottas

“It felt like being in a Finnish sauna today, especially when you stop mid-runs – it’s way more than 60degrees in the cockpit! It makes it tricky with the tyres overheating but honestly, it didn’t feel too bad – a promising start. Recently we’ve been making improvements and I don’t think we’re in too bad a place but it’s only Practice, you never know what teams are holding back.

In FP1 we had work to do with the balance but we made changes quickly and were in better shape for FP2, and no doubt there’s still more to come. We’ll be in on the fight for pole tomorrow and that’s hugely motivating.”

Andrew Shovlin, Head of track side operations

“We got off to a fairly difficult start on the Hard tyre this morning as the grip and balance just weren’t there. As the day went on we seemed to improve in terms of the timesheets, although we’re still finding the balance quite tricky.

It may be that it’s the same for everyone, the track is at 60˚C after all and the tyres are getting really hot which is making the long runs quite difficult. Overall, it is encouraging to see both cars at the top of the timesheets but with a risk of rain it may be a very difficult challenge tomorrow so we cannot take anything for granted.”