HUNGARIAN GP : HAMILTON WINS RACE

Lewis Hamilton wins his second race of the season, the 86th of his career in Formula 1, and takes the lead in the championship standings! Max Verstappen preserved his second place on the last lap of the race against Valtteri Bottas.

Hungarian GP : Hamilton wins race and Lewis dominates Hungarian Grand Prix to equal Michael Schumacher record.

Lewis Hamilton has equalled Michael Schumacher’s record for the most victories on a single circuit by winning the 2020 Hungarian Grand Prix. Hamilton’s eighth win at the Hungaroring equals Schumacher’s total set at Magny-Cours. Valtteri Bottas couldn’t complete a second one-two for Mercedes in two weeks after Max Verstappen hung on to second place. 

Despite crashing on his way to the grid and causing the Red Bull mechanics a pre-race headache, Verstappen managed to clinch second place and hang on using old tyres compared to his Mercedes rival. The Dutchman climbed from seventh to third on the opening lap.

Hamilton: “Believe it or not, it’s still pushing out there. I want to say a huge congratulations to everyone back home – while I was on my own for the race it was a different kind of challenge. Round 1 was multiple different punches I wasn’t ready for, but I refocused, and we’ve just been on point through the whole weekend.”

Verstappen: “It was not how I wanted it in the beginning, of course! But the mechanics did an amazing job to fix the car, so to pay them back with second place was great. To split the two Mercedes is good for us.”

Bottas: “It was pretty…bad race, to be honest. I lost it at the start, I reacted to a light on my dash that went off, and instead of the start lights, so I had to do the start again.”

Hamilton controlled the race from start to finish and was never challenged for the lead. The six-time world champion lapped both Alexander Albon (5th) and Sebastian Vettel (6th) to showcase the Mercedes dominance.  

Lance Stroll backed up a positive Saturday by finishing fourth but his Racing Point teammate struggled to a seventh-place finish after losing out in a double-stack pitstop. Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc missed out on points for the second weekend in a row. 

The track dried quickly and was demanding dry tyres on lap four. Almost all cars pitted sparking chaos in the pit lane. Vettel lost out as Ferrari couldn’t find a gap to release their German driver.

Williams released Nicholas Latifi into the path of a McLaren. Latifi bumped Carlos Sainz’s front wing, ending up with a puncture and a five-second penalty for an unsafe Williams release.

Grosjean and Magnussen found themselves in third and fourth after their early pitstop gamble paid off.

On lap 18, the battle for seventh took centre stage. Albon was asking Red Bull for some more engine power to overtake Leclerc and move away from Vettel. On the home straight and into turn one, Albon moved ahead.

Pierre Gasly became the first driver retirement due to a fire in the back of his Alpha Tauri.

Hamilton was cruising ahead with a 12-second lead but reported an engine problem on the team radio. The Mercedes team told Hamilton to alter settings on his steering wheel.

The threat of rain came on lap 25. Teams were keen to keep their drivers on the track to wait for the rain despite several claims of grip loss up and down the grid.

The rain threat never materialised, and Vettel was the first to pit for the hard tyres on lap 31. Bottas undercut Stroll to move into the podium places. Meanwhile, the Haas drivers couldn’t keep up with the pace of the top 10 and dropped down the leaderboard. 

Despite Bottas catching Verstappen, Mercedes decided to pit the Finnish driver again on lap 50. To close the gap, Bottas needed to record lap times of 1:18.5. Heading into the final stages, Bottas still had a nine-second gap to close. 

With two laps to spare, Bottas moved into DRS range. But the chequered flag beat Bottas and Verstappen held on to second place. 

MATESCHITZ FAVORS VETTEL’S RETURN TO RED BULL

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HUNGARIAN GP : HAMILTON WINS RACE HUNGARIAN GP : HAMILTON WINS RACE