🇭🇺 F1'22 R13: Six Kings

Even when Ferrari are working against themselves, the sight of six cars in the hunt for a victory in Hungary was a vast change from other Hungarian Grands Prix in the past. But again, it was Ferrari in a mirror match against... Ferrari.

When I started writing this blog, I aimed to write about something different each race. But when Ferrari gives you such good material, it would be impossible not to, even if their strategy isn’t the focus of this edition.

Charles Leclerc put hard tyres on on lap 40, despite literally all the pre-race and in-race chat being that the hard tyres were unusable. Haas’ Kevin Magnussen and both Alpines threw on the same compound, and with low track temperatures, found that it was not a good race tyre. Somehow, this inspired Ferrari to put hards on Leclerc. 

They were boxed in a little bit as they went medium-medium on their first stop, meaning they would have had to stop again. If you know you’re going to stop twice, why not go medium-soft-medium and try and lengthen the stints a little? Especially as Leclerc said that he was very comfortable being on the mediums. 

Leclerc’s experiment didn’t last too long, and 15 laps later went back to softs. Even then, he didn’t cut his way through the field, finishing an eventual sixth and falling further behind Max Verstappen, who started from tenth to win the race. 

Looking at Sainz, those four DNFs lead the F1 grid alongside Zhou Guanyu. It’s a massively inexact science, but dropping say… 40 points from failing to finish would have put him second. Despite getting swapped around with Leclerc at the stops, Sainz was the highest-finishing Ferrari, missing out on a podium and possibly getting masked by a late Virtual Safety Car stopping a charging Sergio Perez from stealing fourth.

Last time in France, Mercedes’ team radio was a good comparator, with the team champions being decisive in their communications, as opposed to the apparent disconnect between the Italian giants and their drivers. This time, Red Bull's strategy are the team to compare to the Screwderia (Scuderia - ed).

Verstappen has never won a race from 10th before - in fact, before this race, the lowest he had ever won from was fourth, which - in a race without any full safety cars, or the general chaos of 2021 - is some achievement. Even in last year’s race when Esteban Ocon won, he qualified in eighth.

Verstappen’s controlled drive from tenth is only the 38th victory from that grid position or below, putting him in some very rare air indeed. Daniel Ricciardo is the only other Red Bull driver to win from starting outside the top six. Take the spin out of it, and Verstappen would have won this by a much bigger margin. As for Perez, he benefited from Ferrari’s drunken strategists switching Leclerc from white to red and moved into fifth, with a late virtual safety car possibly stopping him from challenging higher up. 

He remains just five points behind the Monegasque driver for second place overall, although he may also be looking a little anxiously behind him with George Russell scoring great points again at the track where he scored his first Williams points. 

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It felt like this race was being set up as George Russell’s big celebration. A first pole position at a track where you can’t overtake? His first win must be in the bag! With Sainz’s triumph in Silverstone, Russell is the only member of the big three teams to not have a race win in his F1 career, and while there are rules changes in the pipeline, this felt like his - and his team’s - best chance so far. With that said, with just one DNF blotting his copybook, Russell has been a model of consistency, finishing inside the top five in every race this season so far. 

It was also incredibly refreshing to see Russell put up some resistance late in the race with Hamilton on the charge. There doesn’t seem be any team orders at Mercedes. It would have been interesting if Verstappen was a couple of seconds closer to his competitors as to what the reaction would have been, but for now, Mercedes’ recovery and rivalry feels like the most intriguing story in the sport.

And has for Hamilton, like Verstappen, he’s won a race from tenth before - he’s also one of six drivers to have won from 14th on the grid, and the seven-time world champion is getting closer to his best again after the challenges of the first few races. 

Five podiums in a row, despite not troubling the top step, means Mercedes must be feeling in a good place going into the break, with six non-winning podiums for their veteran driver more than anyone else this season. 

But as we head to the summer break, it feels like there are at least six cars in contention for the podium each time the lights go out. It would be lovely if it was more, but six is more than we’ve had in several years. 

PolesWins2nd/3rdsFastest LapsDNFsPointsVerstappen38231*258Leclerc73233178Perez11523*173Russell10501158Sainz11324156Hamilton00620146*RBR - both drivers classifed in Bahrain, but was really a DNF, so included here

The teams go away for a couple of weeks as August becomes the sport’s hibernation. On track, at least. The news is likely to continue before a possible swansong for the Belgian Grand Prix at the end of the month marks the start of another triple-header. 

Even if Verstappen fails to score any points in Spa, Monza and his home race in Zandvoort, he will stay at the front of the drivers’ championship. If it stays like this, there is no way this title fight - no matter how many drivers are fighting for a race - goes the distance. Especially if Ferrari don’t change things.

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