FORMULA 1 ROLEX MAGYAR NAGYDÍJ 2019: RACE ▄▀▄▀ SPOILERS ▀▄▀▄

Not good news and I did not check on their PU status. Getting used to seeing Mercedes under pressure now. Has helped my enthusiasm for the series this year.

 

Well, that was another entertaining race to watch. 3 good races on the trot. Quite an achievement after the shambles of the first part of the season. Of course, it's just a temporary blip before the Merc machine dominates again. Austria, Hock (in the rain) and Hungary all favoured RB and they made the most of it. Once we get to the power circuits, they will be no where. The Honda, though much improved, just isn't good enough to play with Mer and Ferrari engines. You can see that on any decent straight.

Overall, well done Ham - yes, the strategy gave him the chance to win, but I cannot see a single driver down 20 seconds with 20 laps to go believing it was the right call. Credit where credit's due - Ham drove like a champion today and had to take the victory.

Bad luck Max. He probably had the car to win, but the Merc tire swap call caught RB by surprise. I do wonder what would have happened had RB pulled max in for fresh tires though. This track was perfect for their car and he could have caught Ham. But, given the weedy Honda power unit, I guess they doubted that they could actually get passed at the only passing point on the circuit - T1.

Ferrari - this just wasn't our track. No point whinging at the team, as Hungary was never going to be a red victory and anyone that believes otherwise is deluded (IMHO). So... P3 and P4 was actually the best we could hope for. In fact better than we should have expected thanks to Bottles having a calamity of a day and Gasly failing to turn up as usual.

McLaren again doing well. Solid points. Best of the mid pack now.

Russell - nice job. I think he's probably he most underrated driver on the grid right now, and could very well be the pick of the F1 rookies. Surely he'll move from Williams pronto.

As for Stroll - seeing him beaten by the Williams just means one thing; the normal balance of the universe has been restored. He is the worst driver on the grid by a country mile.

 

Other than this the race was a total snoooze fest........only fun is when it’s raining lol

 

Russell to Mercedes. Im not at all sold on Ocon as the next 'thing' around the paddock. Russell and Lando are so good it appears. Russell is very new so who knows. The only real question left for the silly season is what will happen to Bottas. I can see both avenues for Mercedes - keeping or releasing.

Max and Charles has set the scene for the new F1 that will emerge. Now we have Russell and Norris. Hopefully the grid will close a bit and we have more true racing and not procession. I do not think we will have too much 'racing' but I hope closer overall.

Im still amazed at the call from Mercedes and the actual result today. When you have a car of that calibre you can risk a touch more it seems.

 

I wonder if Gasly and Stroll are related.

 

No today's result shows RBR does not have a realistic chance of the title, the Merc. is still the better car.

Plus Shamilton already has a 69 point gap.

 

Shamilton.

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Ferrari's lousy pace gave Ham a "free" pit visit -- which decided the race.
Interesting interview with RB strategist -- who was convinced that Merc was the quicker car, despite Max's pole.

But a demonstration of the value of responding to a dynamic race situation.
(Something Ferrari doesn't seem to do well.)

Vettel getting overly melodramatic with the pass.
Heck, it was team orders. Leclerc pulled over to let Vettel go around, and Seb had to go and dive down the inside of Charles, cutting him off in the corner. Sloppy.

I don't think anyone in Maranello is getting a "summer break" -- too much to do, if they don't want to fall back to "best of the rest".

Good to see McLaren coming back to life.
Gastly spent most of the race stuck behind a McLaren.
And Bottas spent a lot of time trying to get around the other one.
(Until they brought him in for a second stop. Ham wasn't the only one to benefit from newer tires.)

Didn't Schumi do four stops at one race to win it?

 

I believe the teams are not allowed to work on the cars in the summer break.

 

RB has no chance this late into the season. They'll start taking PU penalties soon, too. The game is on for next season, though.*

*There's always next year.

 

I'm excited to see what RB will do next year.

 

I missed it, but makes some good Silly Season speculation. Too bad about Bottas early pit....well let me rephrase. I wish it had been Hamilton.

I was worried Leclerc might get a penalty for dinging his front wing. Racing incident IMHO, but you never know these days. Glad Seb got on podium..."why are we so slow" sigh.

 

First time I have cheered on Hamilton for a long time - great drive and beautiful strategy from Mercedes.

Humiliating from SF to be going backwards in race craft and progress. 40+ seconds behind is rather rubbing salt in the wound

Tony

 

Ferrari as well

 

Cheer up chaps, we knew before the end of practice one that Hungary was going to be tough, and we could have been 5th and6th, so I’d say 3rd and 4th is maximising the package. None of you really think Red bull are going to even get close to Mercedes this year surely, nothing has changed for Mercedes, theyve just had a few rough races, including one comical disaster, but they aren’t going to get beaten to either title.

Ferrari are just racing for themselves, they have no illusion over wins etc, they won’t come this season without mistakes from others. Monza won’t be any different, we’ll just be closer, that’s all, same as Spa.

I want to hear from ferrari that they are using races as test beds for next year, and hiring the best engineers and strategists ready for next year. That alone would make sense. Today, i only watched the first hour because I had nothing else to do, then switched over to watch the soccer, I came on here an hour or so after the race ended (I’m guessing) to see where ferrari finished.

 

Correct strategy by Mercedes. exiting race.

 

Yah it shows when the two front cars have a chance a race can be exciting to watch. Too many races have been a complete Merc run away from Lap 1.

Ferrari is helpless.

 

Even 1/2 of Seb's salary would do it!

 

I do not see RBR stalling...Honda is doing superb upgrades every time, the technical team at Red Bull works fantastic as well...

Today the race was lost due to a rare tactical error on Red Bulls side.

 

Red bull to take a new engine at Monza IIRC. A race where they do not expect to do well in any case...so I guess they'll make 5th where 5th is likely the best result they'll hope for even starting up front...

 

Considering where RBR started, I would not take it as a foregone conclusion.

 

Good race. Congrats to Seb, Lewis and Max. Can't imagine any butthurt anywhere near them.

 

Any race won or lost by the brain trust on the pit wall is not a good race.

 

I thought for sure Max would win this race , kudos to MB for pulling one out of the bag, good race management . Besides that , same old same old . SF going sideways, maybe even downhill and Stroll is sucking huge . This season has been decided already in my opinion , on to next year

 

Not a blatant "tactical error" by RB so much as a rare "bonus pit" opportunity for Ham, given how far back the Ferraris had dropped.

A reactionary pit by RB would likely have put Max trying to overtake Ham.

They were saying "20 sec" for a pit, but many teams were running 22+ sec for the full stop -- not including the lap to bring the new tires up.

It was a gamble by Merc, given the back marker traffic.
But a "low risk" gamble, since they had so much gap back to third place.
It just happened to work out for them.