11/19/2023 0 Comments Max verstappen gearThe demands of Hungary are such that only a fault-free weekend will give anyone a chance of challenging Verstappen unless there is rain. The fast, incisive one or the team we saw at the last round plagued by hesitant management, bad strategy calls and wrong tyre choices. Silverstone headliner Lando Norris has played down the chances of a McLaren repeat because Hungary’s slow corners do not suit their car.Īnd who knows which Ferrari team will turn up. That will, surely, will be an added spur for the man in that place right now, Sergio Perez, on a bad run of form but competing on a street-style track where he is, usually, at his best. Rumour is he could be in line for a return to the seat he abandoned at Red Bull four years ago if things go well. While the man of the moment, Daniel Ricciardo, gets his F1 reprieve back at AlphaTauri and the scene of one of his most memorable victories in 2014. Esteban Ocon was the unexpected winner the year before. The result, though, is a challenging circuit that almost always provides surprise and drama, especially with a new experiment with the qualifying format.Įven Verstappen revels in its challenge, labelling last year’s surprise win from 10th as “crazy”. Having crashed up and down the gearbox around the Hungaroring in a humble hire car myself, quite how the world’s best manage it in 200mph speeding monsters is a constant source of amazement. The Hungaroring is rarely used so drivers have to play a potentially ruinous guessing game over how much the grip has improved lap on lap. GettyĪdded to the demanding topography is the oppressive mid-July sun battering the heart of central Europe.ĭrivers can sweat away anything up to three kilos in two hours while the power units have to survive relentless temperatures with minimum cooling at such (relatively) slow speeds and brakes reaching a scorching 1,000º Celsius.Īdding to those demands is a swiftly evolving track surface as more rubber is laid down. Max Verstappen after winning the Austrian Grand Prix at Red Bull Ring in Spielberg, on July 2, 2023. The pit straight lasts just around 10 seconds and is barely any respite for drivers continually wrestling at the wheel in a double layer of fireproof nomex and suffocating heat. Its 4.4 kilometres loops in and out of a natural bowl so the result is often a breathlessly hot valley that tortures man and machinery across 70 of the toughest laps of the season. The Hungaroring, half an hour up the M3 from Budapest, is something akin to a snaking kart circuit where plenty can go wrong. And they would do well to remember that McLaren’s run was ended by the vagaries of fate and the fumblings of Williams’ stand-in driver Jean-Louis Schlesser. Of course, Verstappen and Perez are no Senna and Prost. They set a benchmark that defied Michael Schumacher and Ferrari in their pomp, Red Bull and Sebastian Vettel’s four-title run and, indeed, Mercedes when they were winning everything in sight with Lewis Hamilton. So instead, here are some bone-fide facts that we still can’t quite believe are true.But not for nothing are the champions now poised to break one of the toughest records in F1.Ī triumph by either Verstappen or teammate Sergio Perez will be the 12th in a row by the Milton Keynes operation, topping a record set by Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost at McLaren in 1988 in what is generally regarded as one of the greatest seasons in the sport’s history. There simply aren’t enough superlatives to describe his achievement. Completing nearly half of the race on one set of medium compound tyres, Verstappen drove faultlessly to claim the chequered flag without giving Kimi Raikkonen in second so much as a sniff of the race lead. And when the stars did align, it just so happened that he was on a circuit where it is notoriously difficult to overtake.īut the fact remains that the 18-year-old beat two former world champions to the top step of the podium, in a car that has generally been slower so far this season. Sure, luck played its part: forgetting for a moment that the two quickest cars crashed on the opening lap, the Dutchman also found himself on the best strategy on account of being behind his teammate for most of the race. Yesterday a teenager entered the Spanish Grand Prix, having raced in F1 on just 23 previous occasions, in a car he hadn’t driven until last Friday, and won.
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