All info you need to see before the next Hungarian Grand Prix starts
As the 2020 Formula One World Championship calendar progresses to Hungary for the 36th Hungarian Grand Prix in history (the 35th time as part of the World Championship), there are still many questions about some teams’ performance, whether they’re working well or not.
With Lewis Hamilton clapping back at his teammate Valtteri Bottas and the entire field with a dominant performance on Saturday and Sunday at Styria last week, the World Championship will have a race at Hungary that might ultimately show if someone is going to be able to compete neck and neck with the Englishman for this year’s title.
Mercedes against Red Bull again at Hungary?
First thing first. The battle at the front this weekend should be a hot one if the last few years are anything to go by. Mercedes has not been dominant at Hungary in terms of results and pace in the Hybrid Era, despite achieving wins in 2016, 2018 and 2019. The Hungaroring will favor those teams with cars stable enough in the corners, so downforce will be a key point.
Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) and Max Verstappen (Red Bull)
Mercedes was great in some downforce-demanding tracks between 2014 and 2016, however, since the new philosophy of cars started in 2017, those tracks were an Achilles heel for them. Ferrari had a well-handling car in 2017 and they were at the front whenever high downforce was needed. In the start and mid part of the 2018 calendar, Ferrari was still a little better than the German cars in those conditions, but Mercedes was catching up.
At Hungary, Mercedes could not compete hard in 2017 with Ferrari and the Italian team had a 1-2 finish in the race despite some issues with Sebastian Vettel’s steering wheel. In 2018, the dry Friday sessions showed Ferrari had the upper hand again, but a wet qualifying gave a shot for Hamilton and he started from Pole on Sunday and won comfortably.
Last year, Max Verstappen achieved his first Formula 1 Pole Position at Budapest in front of the two Mercedes. While the Red Bull took advantage of its great load of downforce, Hamilton was able to stay within range of the Dutchman and ultimately beat him with a great strategy and a great pace to close the race.
This year, the top two should be fighting closely at front, with Verstappen at least putting pressure on the Mercedes.
Did we say Top Two?
The two races at Austria in the last two weeks presented us a clear picture of what we can expect in the first part of the 2020 championship. Mercedes and the one-driver team Red Bull has become since Daniel Ricciardo left, will fight for the podium places whenever reliability issues do not show up. On the other hand, McLaren and Racing Point seem to be a step ahead of the rest of the midfield pack, with Renault still needing to sort out how to have a car that lasts the entire Sunday session.
The key for the Top Two being, well… a Top Two, lies at Maranello. Ferrari’s giant stepback on power from last year has really hit them hard and their number one driver hitting his teammate will not help their cause. Charles Leclerc was the team’s main star in the first race, while his mistake and crashing with Vettel on Sunday ended their race early.
Ferrari is lacking power and their car was not fantastic in dry or wet conditions, so the downforce level is not astonishing either. The Italian giants being so far behind from the leaders and teams like McLaren or Racing Point needing the right circumstances to compete for a podium has left the grid very top-heavy, compared with recent years.
Racing Point VS Renault
Since the winter testing, the looks on the RP20 car from Racing Point have been a major talking point and its close competitors have been talking about a ‘Pink Mercedes’ for a while now. Renault took action after the Styrian Grand Prix and lodged a protest against the pink team concerning the brake ducts on their cars and whether the internal geometry of that part, which is a listed part that cannot be shared among teams, is exactly the same as the ones on the Mercedes W10 of 2019.
Mercedes W10 front next to the Racing Point RP20
Renault’s executive director, Marcin Budkowski said that the feeling at Enstone is that Racing Point is using the same front and rear brake ducts from the W10, but that it is the FIA to determine if that´s exactly the case. “We believe that these geometries in use in the Racing Point are effectively the exact design of Mercedes from last year... So it's not their intellectual property. And that's explicitly banned in the regulation.
“You can copy external geometry from pictures, but it's going to be difficult to copy internal geometry from pictures. We don't know, but it's for the FIA to determine the similarities there”.
The saga continues, while Racing Point “firmly rejected" the claims against them. Whatever the result of this might be, the clashes between this two teams has yet another episode, after it was Racing Point who made the claim that Renault was using an illegal braking system at the end of the 2019 Japanese Grand Prix, from which the French team was excluded.
2020 Hungarian GP Facts & Figures
The first Hungarian Grand Prix was held in 1936 at Népiglet. The race was part of the Grand Prix season (European Championship) and was won by Tazio Nuvolari behind the wheel of an Alfa Romeo.
The first Formula One World Championship race at Hungary took place in the 10th of August of 1986 and was won by Brazilian Nelson Piquet after an amazing overtake on Ayrton Senna. It was the first Formula 1 race held behind the Iron Curtain. The inaugural Hungarian Grand Prix was Alain Prost´s 100th Grand Prix.
Michael Schumacher wins his 4th title and 2nd for Ferrari
At Hungary, World Champions Damon Hill, Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button achieved their maiden Formula 1 victories in 1993, 2003 and 2006, respectively. Most recently, Heikki Kovalainen took his first Grand Prix win in 2008.
The event has also seen two drivers clinch titles. Nigel Mansell sealed his only championship in 1992 with a second place, while Michael Schumacher did it in 2001 by taking his 51st Formula 1 victory (tying the then all-time record held by Prost) and winning his fourth title.
Lewis Hamilton is the most successful driver at Hungary, with seven victories. The six-time champion won the race three times with McLaren (2007, 2009 and 2012) and four with Mercedes (2013, 2016, 2018 and 2019). In 2013, Hamilton achieved the first of his 64 wins with the Mercedes team.
The British driver has won the last two races in a row and will be looking to become the first to win three in a row at Budapest. Michael Schumacher ranks second in the wins tally with four, one with Benetton in 1994 and three with Ferrari (1998, 2001 and 2004).
Among teams, McLaren leads the ranking with 11 victories.
Hungaroring
Though the 14-corner 4.381-meter circuit has been criticised for some races with a small number of overtakes, the venue has given F1 fans some fantastic racing, especially when the weather has been mixed, as in 2006 or 2014.
Downforce is king at this circuit and track position represents a big part of a big result on Sunday. The strategy is also very important. While some races have given us similar strategies among the front runners, we have seen in 1998 and in 2019 race-winning performances with a pit strategy completely different from the usual.
Turn 1 is the most obvious overtaking spot at this track. However, turn 2 offers a beautiful chance for good battles, since drivers can take different lines to make a successful move. Turn 4 has been a great overtaking area too. In conclusion, the first sector of the Hungaroring is the place where a move can be made when battling for position.
The lap records on the current layout (since 2003) are held by Max Verstappen: 1:14.572 min (outright) and 1:17.103 min (Fastest Lap during the race).
What happened in the 2019 Hungarian Grand Prix?
In a grid that had Verstappen and Bottas in the front row, the first lap was crucial in the event becoming a straight battle between Verstappen and Hamilton, who started in P3. Verstappen had a good start and was able to maintain the Mercedes behind.
Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB15, leads Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes AMG F1 W10
Bottas locked his wheels into Turn 1. Hamilton was quicker out of Turn 1 and overtook the Finn around the outside of Turn 2. As Bottas avoided a significant contact with his teammate, it was Ferrari’s Leclerc who also overtook him around the outside at Turn 4, but not before carelessly hitting Bottas’ W10 and damaging his front wing.
Verstappen and Hamilton quickly pulled off from their rivals, extending their gap lap by lap. Hamilton kept putting pressure on the Dutchman, who then pitted for what seemed to be his only pitstop on lap 25.
Hamilton stayed out to generate a tyre offset with the Dutchman and pitted seven laps later. Though he had some trouble with his brakes, Hamilton closed in on Verstappen and took advantage of the traffic to attack the Red Bull racer.
Verstappen was held up by Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo on lap 38 and Hamilton closed in after a mistake from the Dutchman. On lap 39, Hamilton was side by side with Verstappen, but eventually, he couldn’t overtake him.
The Englishman pitted again on lap 48 and got rid of the hard tyres to change to the medium. Red Bull got caught out of place and they could not answer with a pitstop of their own, as Hamilton’s out-lap was already good enough to pull the undercut on the Red Bull.
Hamilton closed in steadily in the first few laps out of the pits, but with 15 laps left, the gap was going down fairly quickly lap by lap. Lap 63 was when the bad news really hit the Red Bull pit wall as Verstappen informed his tyres were “dead” as Hamilton was inching closer are a fast rate.
Hamilton took the lead on lap 66 and won the race. Verstappen made a late pitstop for soft tyres and put up the Fastest Lap of the race of 1:17.203, breaking the track record. Also, Vettel was the only driver of the top teams to change from medium tyres to the soft tyres in his pitstop, which helped him take third place from his teammate with a daring move into Turn 1 with a few laps to spare.
Last year’s race had Carlos Sainz finishing fifth for McLaren, in front of Red Bull’s Pierre Gasly, whose race performance ultimately ended his Red Bull stint, as his seat was taken by Alex Albon from the following race at Spa.
2020 Hungarian Grand Prix - Tyres
The tyres will be the same from the previous two races at Austria: the C2 (white-colored hard tyre), the C3 (yellow-colored medium tyre) and the C4 (red-colored softest tyre).
Given the short calendar and the circumstances, it was determined that Pirelli will be deciding each team tyre allocations for the race. Each driver will receive two sets of hard tyres, three sets of mediums and eight sets of soft tyres.
With the same tyres as last year and the exact same compounds, the strategies will be a big factor in the race outcome and if some rain hits during the weekend, it will be even more important to make the right choices.
Mercedes call to put both of their drivers on the medium tyre for the last part of the race ended up being great for Hamilton, given his race-winning performance at the end. However, Sebastian Vettel did 31 laps on the soft tyre to finish the race and it paid off for him, as he overtook his teammate for third place in the closing stages.
Vettel´s final stint from last year is interesting for this year. Of course, temperatures and the weather (we will talk about it soon) might probably differ from those of last year, but Vettel’s final 31 laps during the 2019 race can be an answer for many this Sunday.
If Red Bull answered Mercedes’ call last year by pitting Verstappen for soft tyres, maybe he could've tried to fight Hamilton, and the tyres would´ve probably lasted with good performance in those 20 laps. We´ll see.
Certainly, a two-stop strategy for the race-winner has not been usual in the last three years, but having a race with the exact same compounds might allow the teams more flexibility regarding their strategies.
Since the move to wider cars and tyres in 2017, there have been only four drivers who scored points while on a two-stopper and the four were from the top three teams at the time: Kimi Raikkonen in 2018 (Ferrari), Hamilton (Mercedes), Verstappen (Red Bull) and Bottas (Mercedes) from last year. Will we see varied strategies? It might be a good choice if the traffic is not heavy, though that is an aspect of the track that can really wreck strategies, given the circuit layout.
2020 Hungarian Grand Prix Weather Forecast
Hungary has had a lot of dry and hot races, but we´ve seen some mixed conditions in the past, more recently in 2014.
Friday, July 17th - FP1 & FP2
Conditions: Storms
Max. temperature: 22°C
Chance of rain: 65%
Saturday, July 18th - FP3 & Qualifying
Conditions: Thunderstorm
Max. temperature: 24°C
Chance of rain: 53%
Sunday, July 19th - Race
Conditions: Partly sunny with t-storm
Max. temperature: 25°C
Chance of rain: 56%
Who will be on the 2020 Hungarian Grand Prix Podium?
Mercedes being a little bit ahead of the field in dry conditions might hopefully be something of the past at Hungary, since the track could favor those cars with high loads of downforce, which might play into Red Bull’s hands. Maybe some other team that can their cars right on point for the twisty track and be competitive.
2019 Hungarian GP podium: 1. Hamilton, 2. Verstappen, 3. Vettel
Despite all the noise, we should not be quick to dismiss Racing Point from having a major weekend at Budapest, if their car´s cornering performance is as similar to that of the Mercedes W10 as it looks, they might have a lot to say this weekend. Unless they get their wrist slapped before the on-track action.
Ferrari, what to say about Ferrari? The 2020 Hungarian Grand Prix is the race where the team is expected to bring a complete revamp of their 2020 challenger, the SF1000, which really has not been challenging anything in 2020.
McLaren is surely preparing a competitive weekend for this weekend. Sainz finished fifth at Hungary last year, while Lando Norris, one of the stars of the two races at Austria, finished ninth, but had qualified ahead of his teammate on Saturday last year.
Can any McLaren driver have a shot at the podium this weekend? It seems unlikely, but if we have other wet sessions, then unlikely results might become probable. Norris surely would love to be competing for another top-five result, as he currently seats third in the World Drivers’ Championship.
The battle for the last point-scoring positions should be fierce once more, with Renault and Alpha Tauri needing to keep scoring to pull ahead of the underperforming Alfa Romeos and the uncompetitive Haas and Williams.
Well, it is prediction time
Our predictions for the first two races at Austria were not fully precise. However, we predicted the top three for the Styrian Grand Prix, though in a different order.
Given Mercedes’ competitive form and Budapest one of Hamilton’s strongest circuits, the Englishman should be a lock for a podium place. Bottas’ good start to the year should make him a contender, but he had a very bad race last year with a nervous start and got unlucky with Leclerc.
Verstappen should be competitive enough, and if Red Bull can have the best car on track on Sunday, he should be looking at a certain win, despite an expected fight from Hamilton. In a dry race, the top two should be conformed by Hamilton and Verstappen, while we will give Alex Albon a good chance of scoring his maiden F1 podium.
The top three for the 2020 Hungarian Grand Prix is 1. Max Verstappen, 2. Lewis Hamilton, 3. Alex Albon, because why not?
This is the third time we predict Verstappen as the race winner, but it is probably his best shot. If it rains, things can change a lot, though Hamilton will probably be the man to beat again, but we're expecting the Hungaroring to really suit Red Bull´s RB16.
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