Hamilton Wins a Record Sixth Hungarian GP and Extends Championship Lead
Image credit – www.thestar.com.my
Lewis Hamilton won a record sixth Hungarian GP and goes into the summer break in a healthy position. The win solidifies his lead at the top of the driver’s championship at 24 points, after his main championship rival Sebastian Vettel came in second.
It was a perfect pole-to-win race for the Briton after winning last weekend’s German GP in dramatic fashion, when he went from 14th place to take the chequered flag.
“We came here knowing Ferrari would be really quick this weekend so to come out with these points, we’ll definitely take it as a bonus. I’m really happy with how strong it’s come in the last couple of races. We’ve got to come strong in the next half,” said Hamilton
The two Silver Arrows started on the first two slots of the grid, with the Ferraris on the second row, knowing that Ferrari will have race pace.
A one-two finish for Mercedes appeared to be in store after Vettel’s pit-stop was delayed and he came out behind Valtteri Bottas. But with six laps to go and after keeping the charging Ferrari in his rear mirror for some time, he was overtaken by Vettel. Bottas eventually finished fifth in the race after colliding with Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo.
Ricciardo’s Dutch teammate Max Verstappen retired early, with a Renault engine failure that infuriated both driver and team boss Christian Horner. “We pay multi-millions of pounds for these engines and for first class, or state-of-the-art, product and you can see it’s quite clearly some way below that,” said Horner.
Kimi Raikkonen came in third for Ferrari after being passed by Vettel on the first lap. No mean feat, given he had to complete the 70 laps, which took place at 33ºC, with his drink bottle disconnected and thus unable to take on any fluid.
Pierre Gasly of Toro Rosso brought home his car in sixth place while Kevin Magnussen finished seventh. Birthday boy Fernando Alonso brought home his McLaren in eighth place. Renault’s Carlos Sainz and Romain Grosjean of Haas completed the points.
The win was Hamilton’s 67th of his career and after 12 races, Hamilton has 213 points to Vettel’s 189. It is the summer break for the F1 fraternity as the next race will only resume on the 29th of August in Belgium.
