Hungarian GP: Martin Brundle on Lando Norris’ endless, Oscar Piastri-Carlos Sainz incident and Malaysia return to the F1 calendar | F1 News

The Hungarian Grand Prix was an entertaining way to end the first half of the 2026 F1 season before the summer break. The top four or five runners were often all seen on the same camera, and that included the drivers of all four racing teams.

Lando Norris has been in brilliant form and has taken both a win and a win position, but without a hard fight in either respect. It wasn’t one of those days where a driver leads every lap from pole position and takes the fastest rap. Oscar Piastri took the lead at the second corner of the race, while Charles Leclerc in his Ferrari set the fastest lap but managed to finish fourth, and that would have been fifth had Lewis Hamilton in his sister Ferrari not attracted another penalty, this time for speeding by 0.1km/h.

It turned out that Lewis let go of the speed limiter too early to beat Kimi Antonelli, who was on the road, in the most important line of cars that crosses the entire track and decides who has the right to be at the front, the driver from the pits, or the driver on the road. It was announced that Antonelli was only a fraction ahead, so Hamilton had to retire anyway. It was a crucial time for the final podium place so the decision that the top speed in the pitlane was a potential competitive advantage was correct, however the margin was narrow.

The indefatigable Norris and the unfortunate Piastri

Norris was on the radio saying he was faster than his teammate Piastri in the lead, without asking to be let go. He then asked to pit first, but the pit wall rightly denied that as a team agreement that the lead of the two drivers had the first option to stop.

It was starting to look like Norris’ slide into Turn 2 and giving Piastri the lead would cost him the win. McLaren pitted Piastri on Lap 16 to close the pit stops from Hamilton and Verstappen, and Norris spun on Lap 17.

But it was the second round of stops on this circuit with high tire wear that made the difference. Piastri pitted again on Lap 33 to cover Hamilton on fresh tyres, and then Norris had a chance to show he was really fast by running hard and pitted on Lap 39, giving him the perfect tire to give his teammate Piastri.

In the final stages of the race, the abandoned drivers were seen to be slow or reluctant to make way for the leaders, and it turned out that there was a problem with the green light warning system. That still leaves the team’s glasses and radio.

In the same 39th lap, Piastri would lap the Williams of Carlos Sainz who had a battle with his teammate Fernando Alonso, and after running too much in the infamous Turn 2 that had given Piasri the lead in the opening lap, and who should have looked for all the world to Piasri to have seen him and let him pass, going back to Sainz. the leader.

Sainz had been told by his Williams team but his position outside the 180-degree turn meant he didn’t have Piastri’s tight mirror on the inside, so his penalty was reduced to five seconds, which was of zero consolation to a justifiably furious Piastri.

Piastri did well not to go outside but he lost a crucial moment and Norris was going to get out of the lead and he would not withdraw. In fact, he will increase it relentlessly despite the third stop under the Virtual Safety Car for the tires to be combined with soft on Lap 56 to recover, very painfully, Piastri’s McLaren which had a transmission problem.

The young Australian hasn’t been able to get any kind of lucky break for the better part of a year now.

Verstappen fights Ferraris

Max Verstappen spent much of the race complaining about aerodynamic degradation, poor handling, and inconsistent gear changes in his Red Bull, but he would finish a comfortable second after some impressive passing on Hamilton’s Ferrari. Max thought Lewis was hard on him in the braking zone, but he wasn’t.

It was explained to me that if Red Bull has damage to the aero properties especially under the car, on an aggressive edge for example, this has a negative effect on the reduction and overall grip. Hence Max’s comment on the destruction of the aero.

Ferrari were looking to win the team during practice, and many people in the paddock thought they were the favorites even though Norris had tipped them. Hamilton cleverly saved the new set of soft tires by removing the first stage of qualifying for the intermediate tires. This would have been very useful for his front row grid, but he suffered a three-place grid drop from a brutal but unintentional block from another driver who was on his last qualifying attempt. You won’t be surprised to learn the driver who was blocked was Piastri.

Leclerc reduced his qualifying with a delete lap time for the track limit, and managed to save a set of lightly used soft tires to start the race with. You may remember that Ferrari dropped the whole pack from the start down to the first corner in the earlier races of the season, but such is the development curve in this business, even with the advantage of the tires, Hamilton made only one place on the opening lap and Leclerc, starting on the right and on the dirty side of the grid, fell from the front row to fifth. And now they had to manage those soft tires and follow the other cars, so their race was quickly interrupted.

Ferrari will try to help Hamilton make early stops on Laps 13 and 30 to get the speed of the new tires. But with Verstappen’s fighting skills this was to no avail. Ferrari put both drivers under the Lap 56 Virtual Safety Car for new soft tires but that allowed Antonelli to move to the front (as explained earlier), a position he would keep until the final podium spot.

Mercedes surprisingly slowed down

Having won the season so far, Mercedes were on top speed, and Antonelli’s three-place grid penalty for failing to raise the yellow caution flags in qualifying when Verstappen spun in the final corner, meant he was ranked seventh, one place behind team-mate George Russell who was also struggling for pace.

George had also collected some engine damage by running over the edge in Turn 4 and would need a new power unit fitted for race day. Whether all this new kit was to blame for the really bad start is still unconfirmed, but Toto Wolff seemed clear that it was a problem with the car.

Everything in a racing car, especially a Formula 1 car, is placed as low as possible to lower the center of gravity, as well as to help cornering, and this leaves parts vulnerable.

Russell would drop all the way back to 21st and begin a long afternoon of battling back to seventh, surprisingly close to Red Bull’s Isack Hadjar in sixth.

Antonelli will defend that podium to increase his championship lead to 50 points over Hamilton at the break, and 59 points ahead of teammate Russell. That is the definition of ‘damage limitation’ from seventh on the grid in a competitive circuit that is very hard to beat.

Liam Lawson would finish a fine eighth and Arvid Lindblad tenth in the Racing Bulls to move them up to fifth in the Constructors’ Championship ahead of Alpine. What a happy and united group they seem to be.

And Nico Hulkenberg scored two points for Audi in ninth place. In my opinion, so far this season I think about Audi consistently and within the top ten for speed, but in fact they are eight of the 11 teams in the championship, which emphasizes that with the improvement of reliability they can be strong competitors in the endless battle for the field in the second half.

Aston Martin made a decent leap forward with aero development, and apparently leapfrogged Cadillac and Williams, and the dreaded Haas, all at once, but they and Honda still have a long way to go. However, in the end it encouraged the Silverstone team.

The championship is far from over

If McLaren made a good improvement move that translates well to other circuits, this was the team’s 14th Hungaroring victory, and with the top four on the horizon, this championship is far from over. There are still 291 points available assuming all the remaining races take place given the Middle East conflict.

On that topic, the Bahrain GP will now be held at the very famous Sepang circuit in Malaysia. This is like the same impressive foresight and flexibility F1 and its partners have shown during the pandemic and I applaud you.

It sounds like there will be a race to fill the European slot in late November or early December if Qatar and Abu Dhabi are not available. We may have to put lights and wipers in that race but the teams and drivers will handle it in their own way as usual.

Have a great summer break.

MB

The Formula 1 season resumes after the summer break with the Dutch Grand Prix Sprint weekend from August 21-23, with each session live on Sky Sports F1. Stream Sky Sports NOW – no contract, cancel anytime