F1 Hungarian GP: Verstappen wins by 33s to give Red Bull record-breaking victory

Verstappen crossed the line with a whopping 33.7s lead over Lando Norris, who had to deal with a late fright from Sergio Perez for second before the Mexican was challenged by Hamilton for third at the end.

Hamilton was slower away off the line compared to Verstappen and attempted to bear right along the straight to defend, but could not prevent the championship leader from claiming the lead into the first corner

As the two had taken wider lines into Turn 1, Oscar Piastri grabbed the initiative and slotted his McLaren down the inside and came up for air with second.

Verstappen then began to stretch his newly acquired despite the array of tyre management being carried out amid the 29C heat, and spent the opening laps building up his advantage.

Lando Norris, who had passed Hamilton for third on a difficult opening lap for the seven-time champion, called into the pits at the end of lap 17 for a set of hard tyres, with Piastri to follow on the next lap.

But a rapid out-lap allowed Norris to blast past his McLaren team-mate and claim a net second place, and the Briton’s next few tours of the circuit ensured that he could build a buffer over his team-mate.

Verstappen then pitted at the end of lap 23 for the hard tyre, and Norris’s collection of opening laps on that compound closed the gap between the front two to just 5.4 seconds.

Norris was unable to maintain that level of pace and, once Verstappen had got to grips with the hard tyre, once again began to crack open the gap and started to go almost a second a lap faster.

By the 40th lap, Verstappen was a clear 15 seconds up the road and the advantage over Norris continued to grow, until McLaren elected to pit its lead driver at the end of lap 44 for a fresh set of mediums.

Red Bull extended Verstappen’s tenure on track with the hards, and the Dutchman carried the tyres all the way to lap 51 before pitting for mediums.

The gap had shrunk slightly to 10.9s in Verstappen’s favour by the end of lap 53 as Norris had been able to make the most of his own middle compound tyre, but a tilt at the fastest lap yielded a 1m20.504s for Verstappen to put the race beyond doubt.

Red Bull’s 12th win in a row thus beats the record of 11 set by McLaren in 1988.

Norris subsequently had his hands full attempting to keep Sergio Perez behind him, as the Mexican had undercut Hamilton during the second round of stops and then passed Piastri on lap 47 with a robust move into Turn 2.

As Perez sat behind by 6.3s with 15 laps remaining. Norris hence had to pick up the pace to try and maintain second. He managed to extend the gap to 6.9s after being given the hurry-up, but started to hurt as the lapped Yuki Tsunoda drew ever closer and allowed Perez to half the gap over the next two tours.

Once the two were both engulfed by traffic, Norris was able to stabilise and having cleared Nico Hulkenberg, had enough clear track to rebuild some of his advantage and had five seconds in hand with five laps to go.

Perez’s place on the podium was then threatened by Hamilton’s late fightback, as the Mercedes driver found great pace towards the close of the race and chiselled away at Perez despite his own traffic navigation.

Just 1.8s split the two with two laps remaining, but Hamilton could not find enough pace in the dying stages of the race and was denied the chance of a podium.

Piastri, who had figured in second during the opening phase of the race, could not maintain the pace beyond the first round of stops and fell down to fifth having been cleared by Perez and Hamilton on track.

Although the Australian tried to keep Perez at bay, staying around the outside at Turn 2, the current championship runner-up did not wish to concede position and held Piastri off – who complained that he hadn’t been left much space.

George Russell claimed sixth after dispatching Carlos Sainz late on, and was promoted a further spot when Charles Leclerc’s five-second penalty for speeding in the pitlane kicked in.

Leclerc managed to retain seventh place at the end as Sainz was not close enough to assume a further position, as the Aston Martins of Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll completed the top 10.

Alex Albon missed out on the points and managed 11th over Valtteri Bottas, who could only collect 12th despite strong pace shown by Alfa Romeo over the weekend.

Bottas dropped spots at the start, as did team-mate Zhou Guanyu, who hit anti-stall and precipitated the first-corner accident that claimed both Alpines.

Zhou managed to get going but dropped down the order, subsequently misjudging his braking to nudge the back of the returning Daniel Ricciardo. This pushed Ricciardo into the back of Pierre Gasly, who could not help diving into team-mate Esteban Ocon and causing terminal damage for both Alpine cars.

DRIVER INFO			Main Information Additional Data
Cla	Driver	#		Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Pits	Points
1	MAX VERSTAPPENRed Bull Racing	1		70	–			2	26
2	LANDO NORRISMcLaren	4		70	+33.731	33.731		2	18
3	SERGIO PEREZRed Bull Racing	11		70	+37.603	3.872		2	15
4	LEWIS HAMILTONMercedes	44		70	+39.134	1.531		2	12
5	OSCAR PIASTRIMcLaren	81		70	+1’02.572	23.438		2	10
6	GEORGE RUSSELLMercedes	63		70	+1’05.825	3.253		2	8
7	CHARLES LECLERCFerrari	16		70	+1’10.317	4.492		2	6
8	CARLOS SAINZFerrari	55		70	+1’11.073	0.756		2	4
9	FERNANDO ALONSOAston Martin Racing	14		70	+1’15.709	4.636		2	2
10	LANCE STROLLAston Martin Racing	18		69	1 lap			2	1
11	ALEX ALBONWilliams	23		69	1 lap			2
12	VALTTERI BOTTASAlfa Romeo	77		69	1 lap			2
13	DANIEL RICCIARDOAlphaTauri	3		69	1 lap			2
14	NICO HULKENBERGHaas F1 Team	27		69	1 lap			2
15	YUKI TSUNODAAlphaTauri	22		69	1 lap			2
16	ZHOU GUANYUAlfa Romeo	24		69	1 lap			2
17	KEVIN MAGNUSSENHaas F1 Team	20		69	1 lap			2
dnf	LOGAN SARGEANTWilliams	2		67				3
dnf	ESTEBAN OCONAlpine	31		2				1
dnf	PIERRE GASLYAlpine	10		1