Charles Leclerc Takes Surprise Pole In Hungary

All the signs from the three free practice sessions pointed to another one-two in qualifying for McLaren. However, not for the first time, Charles Leclerc pulled out all the stops for his final lap in Q3, with a magical lap good enough for pole, Ferrari’s first of the season, bringing their total to 254. Their last one date back to last year’s Mexican Grand Prix courtesy of Carlos Sainz.

As for Leclerc, he hadn’t been fastest in qualifying since Azerbaijan. This was the Monegasque’s 27th pole position, the first at the Hungaroring, and his first front row start at this track. It is Ferrari’s ninth pole at this event, so it now tops the table with McLaren and Mercedes in Budapest.

The top four were covered by just 51 thousandths of a second: 1’15”372 for Leclerc, 1’15”398 for Oscar Piastri, 1’15”413 for Lando Norris and 1’15”425 for George Russell. The gap between pole and tenth (Isack Hadjar Racing Bulls,1’15”915) was only just over half a second.

It’s worth noting that the quickest time of the day was actually set in Q2 by Lando Norris (1’14”890), and Leclerc’s pole time would only have secured him fifth spot in the second part of the session.

Of the 39 editions of this race to date, 24 have been won from the front row – 16 from pole, eight from second place. The race has only ever been won from lower than fourth on the grid four times. The lowest grid position that has ever led to a first-place finish at the chequered flag is 14th, courtesy of Jenson Button in the Honda in 2006.

In FP3, the vast majority of drivers used the Soft to prepare for qualifying. Tsunoda, Stroll, Alonso, Ocon, Bearman, Lawson, Hadjar, Albon and Sainz produced some competitive runs on a set of Mediums, while the Aston Martin and McLaren drivers did their usual scrubbing in of a set of Hards. The Soft was the only tyre run in qualifying.

Charles Leclerc – Pole

‘Qualifying was extremely difficult today. Q1 and Q2 were really tricky. I was on the limit in both sessions, the grip kept changing throughout Q2, I was on the lower end of downforce and when it started to rain, I wasn’t sure I’d make it to the final session. In Q3, I knew I needed a clean lap to go for P3, but I never thought it was enough for pole. I’m really happy with my lap and it’s probably the most unexpected pole position of my career.

‘It’s a big boost for the team. Everyone has been pushing very hard to bring upgrades and take steps in the right direction, so this result shows that we are doing something right.

‘Tomorrow, the start and turn 1 will be key. I will do absolutely everything to keep first place and if we manage to keep the two McLarens behind at that point, it should make our job for the rest of the race a bit easier.’

Oscar Piastri – P2

“A slightly disappointing end to an otherwise strong Qualifying session. The wind just caused us more problems in Q3, especially in the last sector, which meant we weren’t able to find more pace. It’s a tough circuit to overtake on, but there’s rain due tomorrow, so we’ll see what impact that has. Our car has great race pace, so I think we can go forward.”

Lando Norris – P3

“A second-row start tomorrow. The wind changed a lot during the session, which seemed to punish us at the very end of Q3. Well done to Ferrari and Charles, he did a good job on the last lap. In Q2 we saw how quick we can really go, so I expect us to have more pace tomorrow, and that’s where the points are. I’m looking forward to it.”

Mario Isola – Pirelli Director of Motorsport

“It was an incredibly close qualifying session, with the first four covered by half a tenth and the top ten in half a second, which is the best possible prelude to a race that looks like being equally fascinating and spectacular. There’s a good chance the weather could change for tomorrow with the possibility of rain, mainly in the morning but also likely during the race. However, unlike a week ago in Spa, I think that today all the teams have set up their cars for the dry at a track where usually, aero levels are set at maximum. The change in the weather, especially as regards temperatures, could possibly lead to some changes in the pecking order, as was seen in the closing stages of today’s qualifying. All it took was a drop of about ten degrees in temperature, a few drops of rain, and a 90-degree shift in wind direction at key points, such as Turn 5 and the final sector, to mix things up and, more importantly, for lap times to get slower, by half a second from Q2 to Q3.

We have not yet fully analysed the data so we can only come up with some general observations, namely that the drop in temperature may have affected the warm-up on the preparation lap, and not everyone adapted to the changing conditions.

If the race is dry, the two-stop strategy using mainly Hard and Medium tyres is clearly the fastest. The one-stop running Medium and Hard could work for those in the midfield aiming to extend their stints by managing thermal degradation, hoping for significantly lower temperatures than those seen yesterday and earlier today. Among the two-stop options, the strategy involving all three compounds cannot be ruled out, starting on Softs to try and make up places early on and then potentially exploiting clean air after the first pit stop. Overtaking is far from easy here and the undercut is highly effective.”

FORMULA 2

Josep Maria Marti led the Sprint Race from lights out to chequered flag to take his third win in the category. The Campos Racing driver did not have an easy time of it as he was involved in a long duel with his team-mate Arvid Lindblad and on the final lap he had to fend off an attack from Alexander Dunne (Rodin Motorsport). On the third step of the podium was the American Jak Crawford (DAMS Lucas Oil), who took the position off Lindblad in a very close fight after the Safety Car following Sebastian Montoya’s retirement. All drivers started on the Medium, the only exception being Gabriele Minì (Prema Racing), who made the most of having to pit to take a penalty, to switch to Softs.

FORMULA 3

Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak (Campos Racing) took his second win of the season, fending off Ugo Ugochukwu (Prema Racing) in what turned out to be a one-lap sprint after a Safety Car period in the closing stages. Charlie Wurz (Trident) rounded off the podium having passed James Headley (AIX Racing) on the last lap.