Hungary GP Race Report

Going to the grid, Norris, the pole sitter, had a gremlin with his throttle.  It was a mechanical problem and tricky to fix on the grid.  Luckily, it was fixed and he headed into the race on an equal footing to the others.

Everyone got off the starting grid well.  McLaren will need to question their strategy, allowing their drivers to race from the start allowed Verstappen to draw alongside them and they went into the corner three abreast.  Verstappen was run off the track and pushed back in front of Norris.  Norris had lost his first place to Piastri, Verstappen and Hamilton.  He was quickly back past the Mercedes and on the radio to complain about the Red Bull.  The McLarens battling each other had allowed Verstappen to get a slip stream from them.  He was persuaded finally to give the place back.

There were some pit stops.  There was talk of undercuts and overcuts.  Verstappen moaned about his car, which is what he does when he is not in a clear and confident lead.

By the half point, Ricciardo had stopped twice and was running at the back, Albon was complaining as Williams flip-flopped between strategies, Russel had got to seventh and Piastri was holding the lead.

Hamilton had a good battle with his old nemesis Verstappen, with Hamilton holding third place.

McLaren were struggling to persuade Norris to give first place back to Piastri; he replied to his engineer that they should have pitted Piastri before him.  It seemed that they had agreed a team situation based on whoever entered the first corner first, which seems silly and liked they didn't learn anything from the bad old Red Bull days of Vettel and Webber.

It was all kicking off in the last ten laps.  Norris continued his battle with the team; making some very harsh comments.  Behind them Verstappen was trying to battle forwards and took a big risk going down the inside of Hamilton and up and over his car and off.  Verstappen had also been complaining bitterly about every choice his team had made.  JB, his engineer, told him that he wouldn't discuss it over the radio as it was "childish".  The stewards decided it was a racing incident.

The McLaren team radio got incredibly cringe-worthy and with two laps to go, he slowed down dramatically and let Piastri through to first place.  The team also needs to learn from how Red Bull handled things over the radio.

The audience was voted Piastri as Driver of the Day; there is clearly a lot of world wide support for team orders.  He didn't sound very emotional over the radio; pre-arranged race wins aren't the most satisfying.

Hamilton took third, ahead of the Ferraris of LeClerc behind him and Sainz in sixth; how will he reflect on his 2025 team switch over the summer break.  Verstappen held fifth.  Perez made it up to seventh and Russell up to eighth.  Tsunoda and Stroll completed the top ten, just ahead of the their team mates.

The most enjoyable thing about this race was the team radio.  Verstappen continues to blame his team when they cannot deliver the perfect car from him.  He does this much more than anyone else ever did.  Hamilton could throw his toys out of the pram and LeClerc will tell Ferrari when they have let him down and usually they have.

Rosberg was probably the best person to host the post-race interview, as he is relentlessly upbeat and more focused on his performance and appearance than what the drivers are saying.  Hamilton did most of the talking in the cool down room.