Hungaroring, Hungary – Max Verstappen had to settle for fifth place in the end as a collision late in the race with Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton cost him any chance of a podium. After qualifying 16th on Saturday, Sergio Pérez was on the charge in Sunday’s race and took home some valuable points.
It was the two McLarens starting on the front row of the grid with Lando Norris starting on Pole. As the lights went out, Norris and his teammate Oscar Piastri got away well, but so did Max drawing level with the two McLarens and they went three abreast into Turn 1—a squeeze that resulted in Max going wide.
Piastri snuck through on the inside to take the lead, while Norris and the World Champion battled to stay on track and on the outside Max took to the runoff and rejoined in second place. After tussling with Lewis Hamilton, Norris slotted into third. However, with the incident with Max being investigated, the wisest course of action was to give back the place. Heading into Turn 1 the championship leader handed the place back.
Further back, Checo, starting on hard tyres, lost a place at the start to Mercedes’ George Russell, but when a clutch of rival soft and medium-tyre starters pitted ahead of him in the opening laps, the Mexican pushed through to P11 by the start of lap 10.
Russell was struggling to get past Sauber’s Valtteri Bottas, and that was hampering Checo’s progress, but at the end of lap 16, the Finn at last pitted to shed his starting medium tyres, and the Mercedes and Red Bull drivers were freed.
Hamilton was the first of the frontrunners to pit, followed by Norris and Piastri. Max stayed on track, however, waiting until lap 21 to make his first stop. Max’s longer stint cost him a position and found himself in P4, almost five seconds behind Lewis Hamilton.
The Dutchman’s fresh rubber soon got to temperature and gave him the pace to begin to reel in the Mercedes ahead. Checo, meanwhile, finally shed his opening hard tyres at the end of lap 28. On the quicker medium tyres, he emerged in P14 but swiftly converted that to 11th as he powered past Bottas, Haas’ Kevin Magnussen, and VCARB’s Yuki Tsunoda over the following two laps.
with half of the race complete, Max had managed to close the gap to Hamilton. At the start of lap 35, he attacked into Turn 1. Hamilton locked up forcing him wide going into the corner. This gave Max the chance to pass on the outside at Turn 3, however, this time it was Max who made an uncharacteristic mistake and locked up to allow Hamilton to hold on.
The Briton was carefully using his battery to keep the RB20 at bay. At the end of lap 40, Max was freed when Mercedes pitted Hamilton. Released into clean air, Max began to eat into the nine-second gap to Norris. by lap 45 Max had halved the gap, but the McLaren team decided to pit Norris to cover off the Champion’s charge.
Max pitted at the end of lap 49, but despite a stop of 2.3s, he emerged in fifth place behind Hamilton and Leclerc and was charged with passing both in the final 20 laps. Checo, too, had made his second stop, and, with another set of mediums onboard, the Mexican was posting fastest laps. And when Russell pitted for a second time, he climbed back to P7.
Max, too, was powering to fastest laps, and on lap 53, he roared into DRS range of Leclerc. The Ferrari driver defended well, but with pace in hand, Max charged past on the inside into Turn 1 at the start of lap 56.
With 10 laps left, Max hauled his way into DRS range of Hamilton for a second time. The Dutchman attacked on lap 62, but Hamilton defended well. Max went for it again on the following lap, but his lunge down the inside was too late. As Hamilton turned in, Max locked up, and there was contact.
Max was pitched into the air and slapped back on track before sliding into the run-off. Hamilton drove off into third place with no apparent damage, and as Max rejoined, Leclerc swept past to demote him to fifth position.
That left fifth place for a frustrated Max, who was also summoned to the stewards to review the Hamilton incident. Sainz took sixth place, while another trademark Checo charge brought the team six hugely valuable points at the end of a difficult afternoon.
Unfortunate not to be on the podium today, Max Verstappen said, “Today was a tough race for us so naturally that frustrated me as I want things to be better. If you look at the whole race I don’t think we were fast enough; we unfortunately just didn’t have the pace and the strategy wasn’t working for us today.”
Following a very solid drive, Sergio Pérez said, “I think that was the maximum we could achieve today; overtaking was impossible in the first stint on the hard. It was an aggressive strategy to begin on the hard and it worked well for us, from the start it was about putting it all together, making the right calls and the right progress.”
Next up for Oracle Red Bull Racing is the Belgian Grand Prix on the 28th of July.