Saturday Report: 2023 Hungarian GP
Lewis secures stunning pole position in Budapest
Lewis Hamilton took pole position whilst George Russell qualified 18th for the 2023 Hungarian Grand Prix.
The ‘Alternative Tyre Allocation’ saw the Hard tyre mandated for Q1, with the Medium in Q2 and Soft for Q3.
George, looking to improve on his final lap in Q1, suffered from traffic on his out lap and, with the tyres not in their optimal window, was knocked out in P18; Lewis progressed in P7.
The second part of qualifying was slightly more straightforward; Lewis’ pace on the Medium tyre comfortably seeing him through to Q3 in P2.
In Q3, it all came down to the final runs on the Soft tyre and Lewis delivered the Team’s first pole position since last year’s Hungarian Grand Prix. His 1:16.609 just 0.003s faster than Max Verstappen in second.
That ensured Lewis secured his first pole position since the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.
Free Practice 3
Lewis Hamilton | 20 Laps | 1:17.811 | P1 |
George Russell | 22 Laps | 1:18.119 | P6 |
Qualifying
Q1
Lewis Hamilton | 8 Laps | 1:18.577 | P7 | Hard, Hard |
George Russell | 9 Laps | 1:19.027 | P18 | Hard, Hard |
Q2
Lewis Hamilton | 6 Laps | 1:17.427 | P2 | Medium, Medium |
Q3
Lewis Hamilton | 6 Laps | 1:16.609 | P1 | Soft, Soft |
Lewis Hamilton
Pole position is an amazing feeling! I feel so grateful because the Team have worked so hard. We've been pushing so much over this time so to finally get pole position is great; it feels just like the first time. I didn't expect that we’d be fighting for P1 coming here today. When I started my final lap, I gave it absolutely everything. There was nothing left in it.
There’s been plenty of ups and downs over the past 18 months. It's been a roller-coaster ride, but none of us have lost faith. We've all just hauled together and stayed united. We're focusing on trying to steer the car in the right direction. It has been tough, and will continue to be so at times, but I think this shows that we're on the right track and we can do it if we keep pushing. I have to try and sleep tonight now! Tomorrow, we’ll bring our A-game as a Team. It's going to be difficult to fight Max and Lando but let’s see what we can do.
George Russell
Today we were fast, and the car felt great. Unfortunately, we were out of sync with everybody else for the whole session. We have a great Team around us but the whole session just wasn’t good enough for our standards. There was a lot of traffic at the end of the final sector, and the lap was gone when I was three tenths down by turn one. The Hard tyre works well here, especially with the high temperatures, but we were just on track at the wrong time.
It’s disappointing as the car was more than quick enough to get through. When you don’t get things right you get punished and we’ve been punished for sure today. Lewis did an amazing job though so congratulations to him. Tomorrow will be extremely hard, but we’ll be fighting and I’m going to try to come back through. Even though it’s a tough track to overtake, I’ll do my best tomorrow.
Toto Wolff, Team Principal & CEO
We had a package today that was competitive. That’s something we can be really proud of. Lewis drove an amazing lap and put it on pole. If you give him a car, that’s what he can do. We made some good decisions with the set-up overnight and the drivers moved it in the right direction in FP3. The car we had today gave them confidence and allowed them to push.
We made a mistake with George. We should have put him in a much better position on track and we’ve apologised to him for that. There’s a gentleman’s agreement that you don’t overtake one another as time is running out. He had a number of cars move ahead of him though and that obviously screwed up his last lap.
We will be fighting tomorrow, and we know it will be tough. The long run pace of others looked strong but form in the race sometimes looks a little different to practice. We will be giving it everything we’ve got and see what our car is capable of.
Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director
It’s great to get pole with Lewis; he had a really strong session. A lot of hard work has gone into improving the car over recent races and it’s a sign that we’re moving in a good direction. On the other hand, we let George down with how we handled his session. It wasn’t good enough and we’ll review and see how we can improve. It’s obviously very disappointing when we see the promise of the car and that he didn’t get the opportunity to get a clean run in. We’ll see what we can do tomorrow.
Both drivers will be in for a tough race. Max looks to have been struggling more than normal for single lap pace, but his long run was very strong, as was Lando’s. George has a lot of cars between him and the points. We will need to look to offset on strategy to put him in a position where we can start making progress. It’s going to be hot and if we are looking after the tyres well that will bring opportunity. With Lewis we’ll be hoping for a good start and then see what we can do from there.