Verstappen with his expensive trophy that shortly thereafter was accidentally broken by Norris. Photo / Don Kennedy
When Lewis Hamilton took pole position for the Hungarian Grand Prix, the Mercedes faithful were hoped that the winning record of Red Bull and world champion Max Verstappen might after 11 races this season be brought to an end.
But unfortunately the Hamilton challenge was all over by the first corner, and by the time they got to Turn 2, Verstappen was in front, followed by the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris. Hamilton was fourth, and he would finish in that position, while Verstappen just drove away for his ninth win of the season, his seventh consecutive race win and the 44th win of his F1 career.
Given Hamilton races with car number 44, Verstappen jokingly stated that “hopefully I don’t stay on 44, hopefully I can get to 45 quickly”.
With the Belgian GP at Spa this weekend, there will be few people betting against the driver, who is almost assured of becoming a three-time world champion long before this season finishes, extending his winning sequence.
With his pal Norris finishing second, and Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez putting in a spirited drive to finish third, after starting ninth, it was a happy podium. Until that is, Norris accidentally knocked over and broke Verstappen’s handmade trophy vase during the traditional spraying of the champagne, which cost €40,000.
Max was quick to give Lando a “red card” for smashing his trophy, while the latter claimed it was Max’s fault because he placed it “too close to the edge. I fell over it I guess. Not my problem it’s his,” he said laughingly in the press conference.
A broken trophy broken was about the only problem Verstappen had in the race, given his 33-second margin of victory over Norris. His smashing victory means his Red Bull team has now won 12 consecutive grand prix, a new record. When Hamilton secured pole by a very narrow margin of 0.03 s over Verstapppen, you sensed the latter wasn’t too concerned, given the race pace of the Red Bull. In reality, the race was over by the first corner.
“We had a really good start so I’m happy with that,” Verstappen said. “That corner was mine. Luckily it all worked out well.”
Naturally, Hamilton didn’t see it that way.
“The start actually, the initial getaway wasn’t the worst I’ve ever had, but it obviously wasn’t as good as Max’s,” Hamilton told Sky F1.
“Had a bit of wheelspin and then obviously Max was on the inside and he ran me wide and I got done by the two McLarens. So definitely not a great start, kind of reminiscent of 2015 when I fell back from first. And then after that just didn’t have the pace to keep up with the guys.
“If we had the pace we had at the end, we would have been a bit better I think through the day. But I’m going to take the positives from yesterday, amazing effort from the team to get to where we were and to beat everyone in qualifying was really spectacular for us, and obviously shows that whilst we don’t have the best car, it was an incredible lap.”
George Russell in the other Mercedes started from p18 after a shocking qualifying, but helped a little by the two Alpines colliding at the first corner and eliminating themselves.
Russell finished a credible P8 to underline the progress made by Mercedes as the season progresses.
But it is McLaren that seems to have made the made the most advances since the start of the year, and is clearly now the second quickest car in race trim. Norris was asked in the press conference if he can win his first grand prix this season, and gave a cryptic answer.
“If Max retires then maybe,” he joked. “We’re happy with the progress and to be where we are today, fighting for podiums. Our time will come later in the year.
“We had the same pace as Mercedes, we just did a better job,” Norris added. “Three races now with this upgrade, which have clearly been more positive.”
The driver who probably gained the most in the race, in terms of his future at Red Bull, was Checo Perez. His drive has been under threat and he did himself no favours crashing out of Practice 1 five minutes into the session, and then qualifying ninth.
To finish third shows that when he stays on the race track and puts his head down, he can perform, albeit not in Verstappen’s league, despite having the same car.
It was notable that in parce ferme after the race he headed towards team principal Christian Horner and Red Bull adviser Helmut Marko to share the glory of another good recovery drive, by embracing them and accepting their apparent praise. With rumours already bouncing around that if Daniel Ricciardo does a good job on his return to F1 as the replacement for Nyck de Vries at Alpha Tauri, it might see his return to the Red Bull seat that was his before Verstappen emerged on the scene.
Ricciardo did well, finishing P13, ahead of his teammate Yuki Tsunoda. But Perez will have impressed the team that on his day he is the best teammate possible for Verstappen, even if he is now 110 points behind the world champion.
There was a Noah’s Ark look about the result sheet from this latest race. Red Bull, McLaren, Mercedes, Ferrari and Aston Martin, all had both drivers finish in the top 10. But it’s Red Bull that created most of the impressive statistics. In addition to winning all 11 races held so far, the team, and its number one driver, are setting new records.
Verstappen now joins Michael Schumacher, Alberto Ascari, Sebastian Vettel and Nico Rosberg as the only other drivers to win seven consecutive races. There is every likelihood he will make it eight in Spa this weekend. It’s his 24th victory since the beginning of the 2022 season, which equals the total number of race wins Juan Manuel Fangio achieved, and only one behind legends like Jim Clark and Niki Lauda.
Last year Verstappen set a new record for race victories in a season, with 15 wins. He has another 11 races to break his own record. He appreciates the opportunity that his Red Bull team is presenting him with.
“Twelve wins in a row is just incredible,” he noted. “What we’ve been doing for the last two years has been unbelievable. Hopefully we can keep this momentum going for a long time.
“Also, just to work with the whole team is very enjoyable. It’s always good to look into what happened in qualifying yesterday, for example, to keep pushing, always wanting to do better, but days like this are just perfect.”
Not so of course for Hamilton and Mercedes, after having such high hopes by starting on pole. Toto Wolff was not satisfied with the race result after maybe thinking after qualifying that his team had reduced, if not closed, the performance gap to Red Bull.
“We had the second fastest car, only Max was faster. We just didn’t get anything out of it,” Wolff stated.
“With Lewis you hope for a safety-car in the last phase and you also create a tyre difference, so you can go much faster than the rest at the end. However, we lost too much in the first laps.”
Ferrari and Aston Martin are two teams that are falling back in performance, especially Aston Martin, who had the second quickest car early in the season and the twisty nature of the Hungaroring should have suited the car.
To hear Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll both say they that P9 and P10 was the maximum they could respectively achieve in this race will cause the team to do some serious analysing before tackling the high-speed sections that the Spa circuit presents. Alonso’s hold on third place in the driver’s championship is a tenuous one, as Hamilton is now just 6 points back.
But Verstappen is so far out in front, what’s happening behind him is academic. A lead of 110 points equates to more than four race wins. The championship is over as no driver has ever lost a title having amassed a total of nine wins, and it’s only at the halfway stage.
Verstappen is virtually untouchable, and as Norris stated, his only hope of winning a race might be if Max retires or just doesn’t turn up. He will need to do more than just stepping on Max’s winning trophy and breaking it to make any impact on the stranglehold his friend has on winning races.
It is somewhat ironic that the main complaints about one driver winning almost at will should come from Hamilton, who between 2014 and 2021, won a lot of races, including six titles, with only his teammate for four years, Nico Rosberg, stopping his title run in 2016.
With rumours that three teams may have breached the FIA imposed cap on spending, Hamilton has suggested the penalty Red Bull got of a $7 million fine and 10 per cent reduction in wind tunnel testing time “was not a big penalty”.
Horner‘s response was that this was a case of sour grapes, saying: “Believe me, the hit we’ve taken with the lack of wind tunnel time that we have compared to our competitors, is a massive compromise.”
If true, the other teams can be thankful the performance gap is not even wider, because in Hungary Verstappen smashed any opposition, and won’t be crying over one broken trophy, because he knows more are coming.
Heavy rain could also plague the Hawke's Bay and Gisborne on Tuesday.