2017 Hungarian Grand Prix - Hungaroring, 28-30 July

[GPR-A duplicate2]

His dominance in some tracks should analized taking into account that he has had the most dominant car in many years, I agree with this point, but Hungary is not the case. He has won here in 2007, 2009, 2012 and 2013. Its clear that Hamilton is pretty good here.

That clarity can be a little foggy to some because of the h8r goggles. And to think that Schumacher's pole record could be tied next race.

Hahaha true, and Schumacher´s pole record will be gone soon too. Not excited as a huge MSC fan but I tend to consider his championships and victories more important.

MSC operated under different circumstances. In many of his years, they could let go pole for getting the race advantage (varying fuel loads). But in the last decade, especially with refuelling ban and with Pirelli era, the onus shifted completely to get the pole and then dominate from there. If situation was like this in years of MSC, I think the pole record would have been much higher than 68.

[justmoi]

That clarity can be a little foggy to some because of the h8r goggles. And to think that Schumacher's pole record could be tied next race.

Hahaha true, and Schumacher´s pole record will be gone soon too. Not excited as a huge MSC fan but I tend to consider his championships and victories more important.

MSC operated under different circumstances. In many of his years, they could let go pole for getting the race advantage (varying fuel loads). But in the last decade, especially with refuelling ban and with Pirelli era, the onus shifted completely to get the pole and then dominate from there. If situation was like this in years of MSC, I think the pole record would have been much higher than 68.

This is true.

[cplchanb]

Hahaha true, and Schumacher´s pole record will be gone soon too. Not excited as a huge MSC fan but I tend to consider his championships and victories more important.

MSC operated under different circumstances. In many of his years, they could let go pole for getting the race advantage (varying fuel loads). But in the last decade, especially with refuelling ban and with Pirelli era, the onus shifted completely to get the pole and then dominate from there. If situation was like this in years of MSC, I think the pole record would have been much higher than 68.

This is true.

yup....he only had a few poles for 2004 and considering the mighty F2004, thats very few. He probably wouldve swept poles for the entire season if it was purely done on fumes

[Shrieker]

Without rain i expect a very dull race... No overtakes will be the order of the day with these cars. Maybe there'll be a pitlane battle for the lead and/or podium places.

[godlameroso]

No rain expected all weekend long. 2014 was dry and it was a crazy race so it's not a complete given. It's likely to be boring however as the margin for error is so small that no one will dare make an overtake, nor will cars be able to follow one another. We'll need a safety car or two to spice things up.

Tire wear will be a factor, may be a two stopper as a 1 stopper will require some tire management. It depends on the track temperature, if it's higher than 55°C the SS won't last more than 25 laps which means the softs will have to do 45 laps which will be pushing them to the limit.

In race pace the soft and super soft will have little difference so a SS S SS strategy may work.

[SectorOne]

Well, turn 4 should be quite the sight this year. It was already impressive on fumes last year.

[Chuckjr]

Is Ferrari fast enough here to stay ahead if they get ahead--like a good start or fortunate first lap pass...? I'm just not seeing them have the speed they need to stay ahead in the race without some kind of penalty advantage, odd on track happening/circumstance, with the form Merc is showing of recent. They looked mighty in Silverstone.

[GPR-A duplicate2]

Is Ferrari fast enough here to stay ahead if they get ahead--like a good start or fortunate first lap pass...? I'm just not seeing them have the speed they need to stay ahead in the race without some kind of penalty advantage, odd on track happening/circumstance, with the form Merc is showing of recent. They looked mighty in Silverstone.

"IF" Merc has really made a distinguishable progress, as the way it appeared in Silverstone, then even if Ferrari gets ahead at the start, Merc will look for an undercut OR go really long on their stints to come back later with fresh set of tyres and larger speed differential. The way Bottas did in Silverstone OR the way it was in Spain (albeit back then Virtual SC played a part).

The thing is, even if the difference between a fast Mercedes (on fresh set of tyres) and a Slower Ferrrari (tyres getting older) is around 10-12 seconds due to Merc going long on a stint, the faster (the advantage of upgraded car and fresher tyres) car can close that gap considerably quickly and be on tail of the Ferrari with large performance differential that would help in a DRS pass, aka Silverstone.

It is imperative for Ferrari to understand if the performance gap in Silverstone was a lapse on their part of to get the car set up correctly OR if that is genuine. In either case, they have to fix the problem - Correct the setup or bring upgrades.

In Austria, the W08 could only perform on one type of tyres. For Hamilton, it was SS and for Bottas it was US. When drivers switched the tyres, they couldn't go as fast as expected. While Bottas opened a comfortable gap in first stint, he almost became a prey for the hunting Ferrari. In Silverstone, the car was good on either type of tyres. It means, either Merc nailed the setup for W08 and were lucky in Silverstone OR they have found solutions for a good setup. If the case is former, then Ferrari have a chance if they fix their own issues. If the case is latter, then it's a walk in the park for the W08.

I have not heard any news about Ferrari bringing upgrades to Hungary, whereas we have news about both Mercedes and Red Bull bringing upgrades. Red Bull says their upgrades are SIGNIFICANT. Let's see.

[Vasconia]

Hahaha true, and Schumacher´s pole record will be gone soon too. Not excited as a huge MSC fan but I tend to consider his championships and victories more important.

Like Schumacher didn't have massive advantages to win his championships too.

1994 was very similar to 2007 - he won because the Williamses stole points off each other (or Died half way through the season :'( ), Hamilton was on the receiving end, rather than the giving end.
1995 was very similar to 2008 - won at the last second in a somewhat controversial way.
2000 was pretty competitive, but Schumacher had the benefit of a subservient team mate.
2001 was getting pretty dominant, again with a subservient team mate.
In 2002 the Ferrari was utterly dominant.
In 2003 Schumacher probably only won due to having a number 2 driver as a team mate.
In 2004 the Ferrari was utterly dominant.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to belittle Schumacher here. I'm just pointing out that all great F1 champions had some pretty massive advantages either in the form of their car, or the structure of their team.

That applies equally to Schumacher, Vettel and Hamilton.

In 1995 he won comfortably even thogh Williams and Benetton had the same pace. But Schumacher was simply better. The controversial end was in 1994.

2003 was an exciting but crazy year. One race was Ferrari dominant, the next one they were nowhere. There was a lot of fun.

With dominant cars it was clear that Schumacher was going to win, but it was great to watch how he won races where others cars where supposed to win(ex.France 2004).

Indeed. Senna won with the best car, Hamilton wins with the best as Schumacher did. I tend to appreciate more those seasons where Schumacher won with equal machinery(2000,1995) and those seasons where he won spectacular races without the best car car(1996-7-8).

[Vasconia]

MSC operated under different circumstances. In many of his years, they could let go pole for getting the race advantage (varying fuel loads). But in the last decade, especially with refuelling ban and with Pirelli era, the onus shifted completely to get the pole and then dominate from there. If situation was like this in years of MSC, I think the pole record would have been much higher than 68.
[/quote]

Indeed, I forgot to mention this. Fuel loads gave us the chance of watching the fastest cars being a race in 3th,4th or 5th position. Its interesting to see the fatest lap charts which explain how strong Michael was in the race:


1
Germany Michael Schumacher 77 306 25.16%

2
Finland Kimi Räikkönen 45 262 17.18%

3
France Alain Prost 41 199 20.60%

4
United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton 37 198 18.69%

5
United Kingdom Nigel Mansell 30 187 16.04%

6
Germany Sebastian Vettel 29 188 15.43%

7
United Kingdom Jim Clark 28 72 38.89%

8
Finland Mika Häkkinen 25 161 15.53%

9
Austria Niki Lauda 24 171 14.04%

10
Argentina Juan Manuel Fangio 23 51 45.10%
Brazil Nelson Piquet 204 11.27%

Source:[10]

[Phil]

In Austria, the W08 could only perform on one type of tyres. For Hamilton, it was SS and for Bottas it was US. When drivers switched the tyres, they couldn't go as fast as expected. While Bottas opened a comfortable gap in first stint, he almost became a prey for the hunting Ferrari. In Silverstone, the car was good on either type of tyres. It means, either Merc nailed the setup for W08 and were lucky in Silverstone OR they have found solutions for a good setup. If the case is former, then Ferrari have a chance if they fix their own issues. If the case is latter, then it's a walk in the park for the W08.

This isn't quite true. I'm too lazy to fish out the numbers from the FIA event page, so to illustrate my point, I'll just refer to James Allen race report graph:



You can see quite clearly that Hamilton on the SS had the pace of both Vettel and Raikoennen on the US for the first stint. The problem was, that despite being faster than Raikoennen, once he closed the gap, he was unable to pull off an overtake. This compromised his race to the point that Mercedes decided to bring him in early for a longer stint on US.

Bottas was on a more conventional strategy, running the same as both Ferraris. On a heavy car and both being on US, his pace was mesmerizing compared to Vettel. The problem then was that Ferrari pitted Vettel early but left Kimi out, so Mercedes opted to keep Bottas out as long as possible, bringing the virtual gap down.

As reported by AMuS (and I think James Allen picked it up too), the SS are quite crucial in how they are treated in the initial few laps. If you go too aggressive on your outlap, you may be compromising the tire. This may be one of the reasons of why Bottas pace on his second stint in Austria was difficult - he was nursing compromised tire with heavy blistering.

The above reason is also speculated to be relevant to Silverstone. Both Bottas and Hamilton had an easy race in Britain - so both cars didn't have to be too aggressive on their outlap. Both Ferraris were in different positions. Vettel was attempting an undercut on Max (hence needed to be very aggressive) and Kimi was in a race with both Vettel and Bottas. This aggressive driving and strategy is speculated to be one of the reasons why both Ferraris had their front-lefts blown, where as Mercedes had a more controlled race and wasn't (didn't need to be) as aggressive.

In short, I think it's clear that Mercedes has a pace advantage, at least on the last 3 tracks (Baku, Austria, Silverstone). I see no indication that Mercedes was facing tire problems there (except for the blistering) and I think the conclusion that Ferrari was faster on one compound in Austria to be not entirely correct.

[garyjpaterson]

No rain expected all weekend long. 2014 was dry and it was a crazy race so it's not a complete given.

Wasn't 2014 very wet indeed at the start? I remember Lewis, starting from the pitlane spinning at T2 and just touching the wall.

[ChrisDanger]

Just another note on upgrades, Sauber will be bringing a significant aero upgrade.

For Budapest we are set for a big upgrade. Almost all the car – or all the aero side – will be new, so that should give us a good performance boost.

Full interview on f1.com.

[Dazed1]

His dominance in some tracks should analized taking into account that he has had the most dominant car in many years, I agree with this point, but Hungary is not the case. He has won here in 2007, 2009, 2012 and 2013. Its clear that Hamilton is pretty good here.

I don't want to contradict, but want to point out that he won pole position in 2012 and 2013, and was "given" one in 2007.
Also he had a pole in 2008.

Good point. I had forgotten the "Hungariangate".

Re: 2007... It should be noted Hamilton's times in Q1 and Q2 were both quicker than Alonso's time in Q3 so "given" seems a bit unfair.

[TAG]

The Mercedes hasn't any upgrades since Baku confirmed by the drivers. Any differences in speed is down to set up and mapping.

In a post race interview Will Buxton had with a Merc engineer, he mentioned the Silverstone PU was a 2.1 update for reliability not power.