Third consecutive success for Mercedes, McLaren finally effective or a rebound for Max Verstappen and Red Bull? The F1 Hungarian Grand Prix (GP) promises to be very tight this weekend between the three teams who are now neck and neck.
Two weeks after his emotional victory in front of his home crowd at Silverstone, Briton Lewis Hamilton, who has won eight times and taken 11 podiums in 17 GPs at the Hungaroring, will try to follow up on one of his favourite circuits.
His teammate and compatriot George Russell, who had taken pole position in England and won the previous weekend in Austria, is, like the entire German team, also confident. “We have never been so close to the best. This proves our progress. I don’t know if we will be this weekend and in Belgium next week, but if that is the case, we will probably be able to fight for victories until the end of the season,” he estimated.
Before the Canadian GP in early June, no one expected the Silver Arrows to have such a party after a mediocre start to the season. But they first overtook a Ferrari team that was losing momentum, and managed to catch up with McLaren and Red Bull.
“We are no longer dominant”
Even the reigning triple world champion from the Netherlands admits it: “We are no longer dominant and I don’t expect that to change this weekend. So we will have to optimise the set-up and maximise the opportunities,” Max Verstappen stressed on Thursday.
While the Austrian team had won 21 races out of 22 in 2023 and 17 out of 22 in 2022, at the mid-point of the 2024 season, it had already lost 5 GPs out of 12, a sign that the competition is constantly getting closer.
McLaren is regularly the fastest team and is racking up podiums, but is struggling to turn this dominance into victory by making a series of small errors or poor strategic choices, as at Silverstone two weeks ago. “We are regularly battling with teams that have dominated the discipline for years, so we have less experience. It’s not an excuse to make mistakes, but we continue to learn. Yes, over the last two months we haven’t seized certain opportunities, but we mustn’t forget where we were a year ago,” argued Australian Oscar Piastri.
Ferrari “not so far” from the best
And Ferrari in all this? The Scuderia, second force in the field until the end of May, like Charles Leclerc’s victory on home soil, in Monaco, hopes to get back into the fight. “We are not that far, we are only missing two or three tenths so I am confident that we can catch up and join the fight for victories in the second half of the season,” explained the Spaniard Carlos Sainz, who has still not announced his destination for 2025.
A new floor will be used in Hungary by the Prancing Horse cars to try to reduce the rebound phenomenon that has penalised them in recent races. However, more than that will probably be needed to allow Ferrari to return to the level of the top three teams.
On the French side, Alpine will try to get back on track after two very complicated weekends in a row. But the French team, which is not bringing anything new to Hungary, will have a lot to do. “Some teams are making big progress, like Haas, and we have to try to keep up. But it will be difficult to score points until we have something new,” admitted Frenchman Pierre Gasly on Thursday.