Categories: FeatureFeatures

Hungarian Grand Prix review

After Sebastian Vettel's second victory of the year in a chaotic race, F1i looks back at how the Hungarian Grand Prix unfolded and opens itself up to future ridicule by checking just how accurate its podium prediction was…

The race in 100 words

An incredible start from the Ferraris saw Vettel lead Raikkonen on the opening lap and the pair pulled away as mistakes from Hamilton dropped him to tenth. Collisions galore saw a number of penalties before Hulkenberg's front wing failure caused a safety car period, bunching up the field. With Raikkonen having to retire, Rosberg was up to second but under pressure from Ricciardo, and contact between the two gave Rosberg a puncture and demoted him to P8. Vettel took an impressive victory, Kvyat inherited second from Ricciardo while Verstappen and Alonso also benefitted to take fourth and fifth from Hamilton.

Driver of the weekend

Before the lights went out it looked for all the world like Lewis Hamilton would receive the F1i plaudits, but it's Sebastian Vettel who gets the nod after classic Vettel drive. An impressive start saw him lead in to Turn 1 and Vettel then managed the pace following three very quick opening laps, just like he used to at Red Bull. Even the Safety Car which erased his lead didn't affect him, and Vettel was one of few drivers to enjoy a faultless race.

Move of the race

While it wasn't quite a repeat of 2014's race, Daniel Ricciardo was back to his best in terms of race craft. Attacking throughout, Ricciardo was once again imperious on the brakes and his move on Lewis Hamilton at the Safety Car restart was impressive, outbraking the championship leader around the outside of Turn 1. Though Hamilton duly drove in to the side of him and Ricciardo was forced off, he still got the rest of the move done in the following two corners.

Prediction accuracy

Podium: 1. Sebastian Vettel, 2. Daniil Kvyat, 3. Daniel Ricciardo

F1i’s pre-race prediction: 1. Nico Rosberg, 2. Lewis Hamilton, 3. Kimi Raikkonen

Weekend recap

Friday

Hamilton heads Red Bull pair in FP2

Gallery

Saturday

Masterful Hamilton eases to Hungary pole

Gallery

Sunday

Vettel wins chaotic Hungarian GP from Kvyat

Gallery

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.