Lewis Hamilton dominated the FORMULA 1 ARAMCO MAGYAR NAGYDÍJ 2020, leading from start to finish. The race was constantly under threat of rain, but it never materialized.
Before the race, Max Verstappen’s mechanics needed to rush to repair his Red Bull after he had an issue driving to the grid. His team was narrowly able to get the car ready in time for the race.
All the drivers started the race on the intermediate tyres for the damp track conditions, except for both Haas drivers on the full wet tyres. On the formation lap, Daniil Kvyat wanted to pit for slick tyres and start from the pit lane, but his team told him to stay out.
Haas did the opposite, pitting both Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean for the slick tyres, opting to start from the pit lane instead of the rear half of the grid.
At the start of the race, Valtteri Bottas had a slow start after jumping the start, but the stewards opted not to give the Finn a panelty. Both Ferraris got away strong off the grid, with Charles Leclerc diving along the pit wall to get around the slower Bottas, who dropped to P6. Verstappen was wheel-to-wheel around the outside of Leclerc into the first turn, taking P3.
After a strong start, Lewis Hamilton managed to create a 3 second gap in the front.
It wasn’t long before the drivers started to ditch their intermediate tyres. Leclerc and Bottas were the first to pit for new tyres. Leclerc took a set of the soft tyres and Bottas took the mediums.
This triggered a hectic flood of pit stops the following lap. Nearly all of the drivers pitted, making a very busy pit lane. Sebastian Vettel lost out big in the pit lane when the team struggled to find a hole in the pit lane traffic.
When the pit stops were finally over, most drivers were on the yellow medium tyres. The two Haas drivers found themselves in P3 and P4, having already pitted for slicks on the formation lap. They eventually dropped to P5 and P6 as Lance Stroll and Bottas stormed their way through.
Many of the teams predicted light rain set to arrive around lap 25-30, but it drifted wide of the circuit.
Leclerc and Alexander Albon were battling hard over P7. The Red Bull driver was eventually able to get by the Ferrari youngster. Leclerc then swapped with his teammate. With a train forming behind Leclerc, he begged the team to pit for new tyres. He came in on lap 21, grabbing a set of the hard compound tyres.
Vettel pitted for tyres on lap 30. He opted for the hard tyres, like his teammate.
Leclerc and Lando Norris had a good battle at the back of the field, getting wheel-to-wheel at many points throughout the race. On one such occasion, Leclerc nearly collided with Norris when his Ferrari had some oversteer on the inside of turn two. Leclerc was eventually able to get by Norris around the outside of turn two.
Despite some misty rain on the start/finish straight, the teams no longer believed that the rain on the forecast would arrive. The majority of the rain hit outside of the circuit.
This triggered a second set of pit stops to replace everyone’s old tyres. Bottas was the first to pit for a new medium tyres, attempting to undercut Stroll of P3.
Racing Point did not immediately respond to the undercut attempt from Mercedes, waiting two whole laps to pit, at which point Bottas was already in a position to comfortably inherit P3.
Verstappen was forced to pit on lap 37 for new hard tyres because Bottas was more than 3 seconds a lap faster. Hamilton pitted the the following lap for a fresh set of mediums.
Ten laps later, Bottas was able to close within DRS range of Verstappen, looking to get Mercedes another 1-2 finish. But Verstappen quickly turned up the engine to create to stretch the gap to the Mercedes.
With just ten laps remaining in the race, Bottas began a charge to close back to Verstappen. He reduced the gap back down to 10 seconds, which had been more than 20 seconds at one point. He looked set to catch Verstappen in the closing laps of the race.
On the other side of the Mercedes garage, Hamilton’s engineers took advantage of a free pit stop with 4 laps remaining for a fresh set of soft compound tyres to try and set the fastest lap of the race and earn the extra championship point associated with it. He was able to set the fastest lap, despite leaving the pit lane in traffic.
At the start of the final lap, Bottas found himself well within the DRS range of Verstappen, just over 0.6 seconds behind the Red Bull. Despite his best effort, he was not able to advance to the second step of the podium.
Bottas had to settle for the bottom step of the podium below Verstappen. But it was Hamilton on top of the podium and now on top of the World Drivers’ Championship table.
With the first three races of the chaotic 2020 Formula One season now completed, the drivers and teams have earned themselves a well-deserved week break. Next up on the calendar is the British Grand Prix in two weeks on the weekend of August 2 for the first of two races to be held at that circuit this season.
Above results table does not include any post-race penalties
