Max Verstappen lifts the trophy accrediting him as the winner of the Hungarian Grand Prix. /
Hungarian GP
Ferrari delivers three quarters of the title to the Dutchman on a platter, who claims victory after starting from tenth place
Justifying the poor performance of Ferrari in the Hungarian GP race could not be more difficult. In the ‘tifosi’ it is somewhat embarrassing to see how the Scuderia is capable of sacrificing itself race after race, either with the strategy, the pit stops, the pace or all at the same time, as happened this Sunday at the Magyar track. It is difficult to explain with data in hand that Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc, who started second and third and had shown a much higher net pace than their rivals, finished off the podium. It is even more understandable that Max Verstappen achieved victory starting from tenth place, the biggest comeback of his life in Formula 1, since he has a car that works and, above all, strategists who have some idea of how to read races. . Something that obviously does not happen at Ferrari.
And the race did not start badly at all. George Russell, who started from pole, saw how Sainz feigned the attack to the point of forcing him to defend himself tooth and nail. With some black clouds hanging over the circuit and a changing forecast, in the team of the silver arrows they considered it good to resist and that it was what God wanted. They didn’t expect help from Ferrari as soon as at the first stop, in which Sainz was deprived not only of fighting with Russell, but was taken out behind his own teammate. Leclerc became the Scuderia’s bet for victory, with Sainz trying to save the podium. It was feasible until the Italian team swallowed the Red Bull bait, as usually happens.
Verstappen changed everyone’s script. Aware that he had better pure pace and that in cold temperatures he could make the medium tires work better, he brought his stop forward enough to force Russell and Leclerc to do the same. The logical thing was to mount other mediums and try to go for soft ones in the end, especially after seeing that moments before Alpine had mounted the hard ones in the cars of Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon and they suffered an unsustainable hemorrhage of time. It was seen on television and in the rest of the teams. The hard ones didn’t work; They were the wheels to dodge. Russell rode medium, Leclerc hard and Ferrari lost the race.
Not a spin from Verstappen after passing the Monegasque saved him the furniture, because the world champion knew how to save the situation and passed not once, but twice, to a desperate Leclerc. The Monegasque saw how he was ridden five laps later by the soft ones that they had already tested in Sainz. afternoon. And it is that if the strategy with Leclerc was bad, with the Spanish it was only slightly better. 23 laps from the end they put the soft ones with which he finished the race, playing into the hands of Mercedes, who only had to stretch Hamilton’s entry a little more than expected. No more than five laps, to get to the last part of the race in better conditions. From being big favorites to a more than feasible double, to staying off the podium and with the main rival 80 points away. At Ferrari they are going to have a very complicated holiday.
Alonso has the enemy at home
Fernando Alonso finished eighth, just ahead of his teammate Ocon but not much less thanks to him. In fact, if it had been up to the Frenchman, the Spanish from Alpine would not even have completed the first lap. «Never in my life had I seen a defense like Esteban’s. Never! », Alonso complained on the radio after his own teammate kicked him off the track twice in the first corners of the race. Although Ocon returned the position after seeing that he did not have comparable race pace, he was again singled out for his way of understanding the work of two drivers within the same team.
Luckily for Alonso, he had good sense and reflexes to maintain a good eighth place that makes him add three more points in his overall standings and keep his streak of eight races intact in the top ten. He will now be able to rest these days while he has just decided, because he has promised that after the summer he will make a decision about his future with Alpine. or with another team.
Sainz embraces the official speech: “There was no rhythm”
Carlos Sainz did not want to pull his nails against Ferrari despite the fact that he had a golden opportunity after the disastrous Hungarian GP that Ferrari caught on. The Spaniard embraced the official speech and justified staying out of the box in that the benefits this Sunday were not as expected. «Perhaps the strategy was the least of it. We just had no pace with any tire compound or condition. It is clear that these temperatures compared to Friday have affected us badly and we have suffered with all the compounds and the balance of the car, “said the driver from Madrid. «It cost us a lot the whole race because there was no rhythm with any compound. It seemed that that half a second per lap that Red Bull put us today we put it on Friday with a lot of heat. It is clear that this cold has changed the situation and even Mercedes was going faster,” Sainz argued. The Spaniard from Ferrari explained something worse about the pit stops. Once again, he was the loser. “Obviously the two pit-stops cost us a bit of time in the race that needs to be analysed, but other than that there was no pace,” he insisted. It is clear that Sainz cannot be blamed for not making costumes.
In the case of Fernando Alonso, he is in a sweet moment, at least in terms of points. The Spaniard added his eighth consecutive grand prix in the top ten, although he was about to get thrown in the first corners. The culprit was his own partner, Esteban Ocon, who defended himself in too extreme a way. «I had to lift in turn 1, in turn 2 and then in turn 5 especially, which was outside him. He was quite aggressive in that first lap, but I got up and that way we didn’t touch each other », explained the Spaniard with a slightly crooked gesture, but without further criticism. Despite the fact that a few moments before he had assured that “never” in his life had he seen such a defense. As for the race itself, Alonso was satisfied. «Once again a race where we started in a good position and it was difficult for us to score points. The eighth is fine, after much struggle. One stop we knew it was going to be complicated and to the limit, and that’s how it was. The rain at the end, the truth is that it brought a lot of stress when we didn’t need it, but happy », he summed up, before praising the rest that lies ahead until the always hectic Belgian GP.
