Mercedes AMG Formula One team had a eventful Hungarian grand prix after Valtteri Bottas caused melee forced six drivers to retire from the race, including Fin himself. Lewis Hamilton charged from the 14th to score a podium with a P3 finish, while Bottas had DNF.
Lewis Hamilton had a great start from the Pole at drizzling Hungaroring, but his race was ruined by team mates’ bad start. Lando Norris from P6 on the grid made a fantastic getaway, making his way past Bottas’ Mercedes on the drag down to the first corner.
The Finn, though, locked up as he tried to get his W12 slowed down, running into the back of Norris, who then cannoned into Verstappen’s second-placed Red Bull, as Bottas slid into Perez’s sister Red Bull, with Pierre Gasly having to take avoiding action.
Hamilton led the field round on the warm-up lap during red flag restart, the track having dried dramatically in the intervening time. Hamilton opted not to pit ahead of the restart, but the other 14 drivers still in the race all stopped for mediums.
This mistake by Lewis and Mercedes caused them badly in the end, as Hamilton dropped to 14th at the end of the first lap after the red flag restart.
But Mercedes pulled strategy stroke to pit Hamilton early for fresh Hard tyres and gave Lewis chance to undercut both Max Verstappen and Ricciardo. Another stop for fresh Mediums handed advantage to fast Mercedes over Alonso and Sainz.
Hamilton having tried and failed on successive laps to pass the Spaniard in a titanic battle between the old team mates. In the end on Lap 65, Lewis made important overtake after Alonso locked up at Turn 1.Two laps later , The Brit passed Carlos Sainz to move into P3.
Lewis Hamilton (192 points) leads the Drivers’ Championship by 6 points from Max
Verstappen (186) and Lando Norris in P3 (113), with Valtteri (108) in P4.
The Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team (300 points) lead Red Bull by 10 points in the
Constructors’ Championship.
Lewis Hamilton (P3)
“First of all, I want to say a quick congratulations to the Alpine Team and to Esteban – he’s been a shining star for some time now so it’s been a long time coming and I’m really, really happy for him. It’s great to see Aston Martin up there with their best result so far and I know there’s more to come from them. We’ve had an amazing crowd this weekend and I’m grateful for the support.
Today was definitely tough, it’s crazy to think we were the only ones on the grid at the start, but these things happen in an unpredictable race, and we will learn any lessons that need to be learnt. I gave it everything today and I had nothing left at the end. I came into this weekend not knowing how we would perform and considering the circumstances today, I’ll take P3!”
Valtteri Bottas (DNF)
“I had a poor start with lots of wheelspin off the line, lost a couple of places and then into turn one, I was right on the gearbox of Lando and locked the wheels. I misjudged the braking point – it’s always difficult starting a race in those conditions, you’re always ‘guesstimating’ grip levels and today I got it wrong. I’ve spoken to Lando and Checo to apologise, it was my bad today and sometimes you have to
hold your hands up.”
Toto Wolff, CEO & Team Principal
“A difficult start for Valtteri, he suffered wheelspin off the line and found himself sandwiched into the first corner and missed the braking point. A small mistake with large consequences and damage to several cars, and I’m sorry to McLaren and Red Bull – to lose out in an accident like that at the start of the race is tough to take.
We then had a decision to make with Lewis on the race restart and I stand absolutely behind our decision, keeping him out was absolutely the right call for us, even if it was a little lonely for him out there.
It would have been a gamble to pit from the lead, the track tried unbelievably quickly in the sun and it could have easily gone the other way, and then we would have looked foolish for bringing him in. It was a courageous drive from Lewis to carve his way back through the field and the win was possible at the end, but Fernando defended strongly and perhaps it wasn’t our day to win.”
Andrew Shovlin, Head of track side operations
“Congratulations to Esteban and Alpine on the win. For us it wasn’t a very tidy day – Valtteri had a very poor start and then his mistake at turn 1 obviously ruined the day for Max, Sergio and Lando; we can only apologise for that, although it’s not much by way of consolation. Given the position we were in at the restart, we didn’t particularly want to gamble on slicks but we were surprised when the entire grid left on intermediates.
It was even more surprising to see them all pit on the formation lap. That is obviously one of the key moments of the race for us, although we wouldn’t have been leading on the restart as having the first garage means the field coming in behind us prevents us from leaving our pit box. Recovering from last position was clearly then an enormous challenge for Lewis and to get to third took everything he had.
It’s such a difficult track to overtake on and we had to convert to the two-stop to get through but unfortunately we spent too many laps behind Fernando and that meant Lewis was only catching the leaders on the last lap. It’s frustrating to have given away a chance to win here but encouraging that the car was really good – we weren’t expecting to be so strong. We’ve got a week before the summer shutdown and there’s lots to do in the next few days to prepare for a triple header on our return but
it’s going to be nice to have some time off as it’s been non-stop since testing back in February.”
