Hungarian GP: Martin Brundle on ‘relentless’ Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri-Carlos Sainz incident and Malaysia return to F1 calendar | F1 News

The Hungarian Grand Prix was an entertaining way to finish the first part of the 2026 F1 season before the summer break. The top four or five runners were often all visible in the same camera shot, and that included drivers from all four front running teams.

Lando Norris was on brilliant form and took both pole position and the victory, but not without a serious fight in both respects. It wasn’t one of those days where a driver leads every lap from pole position and takes fastest lap. Oscar Piastri seized the lead in the second corner of the race, and Charles Leclerc in his Ferrari secured fastest lap but could only muster a fourth-place finish, and that would have been fifth had Lewis Hamilton in the sister Ferrari not attracted yet another penalty, this time for speeding in the pit-lane by 0.1kph.

It turns out Lewis did release the speed limiter a fraction early in order to beat Kimi Antonelli, who was on track, to the all-important safety car line which crosses the entire track and which decides who has the right to be in front, the driver exiting the pits, or the driver on track. It was declared that Antonelli was there a fraction earlier, and so Hamilton had to yield anyway. It was a pivotal moment for the final podium place and therefore the decision that speeding in the pitlane was a potentially competitive advantage was correct, however small the margin.

Relentless Norris and unfortunate Piastri

Norris was on the radio saying that he was faster than team-mate Piastri in the lead, without specifically asking to be let through. Then he asked to pit first, but the pit wall rightly denied that as team protocol is that the leading of the two drivers has first option on stopping.

It was beginning to look like Norris’ slide wide in Turn 2 and handing the lead to Piastri would cost him a victory. McLaren pitted Piastri on Lap 16 to cover off the pit stops from Hamilton and Verstappen, and Norris next lap around on Lap 17.

But it was the second round of stops on this high tyre wear circuit that made the difference. Piastri pitted on Lap 33 again to cover Hamilton on fresh tyres, and then Norris had his chance to prove he was indeed faster by running hard and pitting on Lap 39, giving him a decent tyre life offset to his team-mate Piastri.

Through the latter stages of the race lapped drivers appeared to be slow or even reluctant to clear the way for the leaders coming through, and it turns out there was an issue with the blue light warning system. That does still leave mirrors and team radio though.

On that same Lap 39, Piastri was coming up to lap Carlos Sainz’s Williams who was having his own battle with fellow countryman Fernando Alonso, and after running wide in the infamous Turn 2 which had given Piastri the lead on the opening lap, and which must have looked for all the world to Piastri that he’d seen him and was letting him through, just as Sainz swung heavily back to the racing line and clashed with the race leader.

Sainz had been informed by his Williams team but his position on the outside of a 180 degree turn meant he had no mirror sight of Piastri tight on the inside, and so his penalty was mitigated down to five seconds, which was zero comfort to a rightly angry Piastri.

Piastri did well not to spin out but he lost crucial time and Norris would emerge from the pits into a lead he would not relinquish. In fact, he would relentlessly increase it despite a third stop under a Virtual Safety Car for fresher soft compound tyres on Lap 56 to recover, so painfully, Piastri’s McLaren which had suffered transmission failure.

The young Australian hasn’t been able to catch any kind of lucky break for the best part of a year now.

Verstappen fights off Ferraris

Max Verstappen spent much of the race complaining about aerodynamic degradation, poor handling, and inconsistent gear shifting with his Red Bull, but would finish in a fine second place after some impressive overtakes on Hamilton’s Ferrari. Max thought Lewis was a bit tough on him in the braking zone, but he wasn’t.

It was explained to me that if the Red Bull has any damage on the aero parts particularly underneath the car, on an aggressive kerb for example, this has a disproportionate affect on the overall downforce and so grip. Hence Max’s aero degradation comment.

Ferrari had looked the team to beat throughout practice, and most folk in the paddock thought they were favourites even though Norris pipped them to pole. Hamilton had smartly saved a brand new set of soft tyres by clearing the first stage of qualifying on medium tyres. These would have been extremely handy from his front-row grid slot, but he attracted a three-place grid drop from a rather brutal but unintentional blocking of another driver who was on his final qualifying attempt. You’ll not be surprised to read the blocked driver was Piastri.

Leclerc fluffed his qualifying with a delete lap time for track limits, and had only managed to save a set of lightly used soft tyres to start the race with. You may remember that Ferrari humbled the entire pack from the start down to the first corner in the earlier races of the season, but such is the development curve in this business, even with a tyre advantage, Hamilton only made up one place on the opening lap and Leclerc, starting on the right hand and dirtier side of the grid, fell from the front row to fifth. And now they had to manage those soft tyres and following other cars, and so their race was immediately compromised.

Ferrari would try to help Hamilton with relatively early stops on Laps 13 and 30 for the speed of fresh tyres. But with Verstappen’s combative prowess this paid no dividends. Ferrari pitted both drivers again under the Lap 56 Virtual Safety Car for fresher soft tyres but that only served to allow Antonelli to get ahead (as explained earlier), a position he would keep to the final podium spot.

Mercedes curiously off the pace

Having dominated this season so far, Mercedes were curiously off the ultimate pace, and a three-place grid penalty for Antonelli for failing to sufficiently lift for yellow warning flags in qualifying when Verstappen spun in the final corner, meant that he had lined up seventh, one place behind team-mate George Russell who was also struggling for pace.

George had also collected some engine damage with a run over the kerbs in Turn 4 and would need a new power unit fitted for race day. Whether all this new kit was responsible for a truly awful start is not so far certain, but Toto Wolff seemed clear it was a car issue.

Everything on a racing car, and especially a Formula 1 car, is positioned as low as absolutely possible to lower the centre of gravity, and so helping the handling through corners, and this leaves components vulnerable.

Russell would drop all the way back to 21st and begin a long afternoon fighting back to seventh place, tantalisingly close to Isack Hadjar’s Red Bull in sixth.

Antonelli would secure that podium to increase his championship lead to 50 points over Hamilton heading into the break, and 59 points over his team-mate Russell. That’s very much the definition of ‘damage limitation’ from seventh on the grid in such a competitive field on a circuit notoriously difficult for overtaking.

Liam Lawson would finish a fine eighth and Arvid Lindblad 10th for Racing Bulls to move them up into a fifth in the Constructors’ Championship ahead of Alpine. What a happy and cohesive team that appears to be.

And Nico Hulkenberg scored two points for Audi in ninth. In my mind’s eye, so far this season I think of Audi consistently around and inside the top ten on pace, but actually they are eighth of 11 teams in the championship, underlining that with an improvement in reliability they can be strong contenders in the relentless midfield battle in the second half.

Aston Martin made a decent jump in performance with a comprehensive aero upgrade, and apparently leapfrogging Cadillac and Williams, and threatening Haas, all at once, but they along with Honda still have a long way to go. Nonetheless it was finally encouraging for the Silverstone team.

Championship far from over

If McLaren have made a decent upgrade step which translates well to other circuits, this was the team’s 14th Hungaroring victory, and with the top four are ever closer, this championship is far from over. There are still 291 points available assuming all the remaining races take place given the Middle East conflict.

On that subject, the Bahrain GP will now be run at the very popular Sepang circuit in Malaysia. This is the same impressive lateral thinking and flexibility F1 and its partners showed during the pandemic and I applaud it.

It sounds as if there will definitely be a European replacement race in late November or early December if Qatar and Abu Dhabi can’t take place. We may need to fit some headlights and wipers for that race but the teams and drivers will handle it in their stride as usual.

I wish you all a happy summer break.

MB

The Formula 1 season resumes after the summer break with a Sprint weekend at the Dutch Grand Prix from August 21-23, with every session live on Sky Sports F1. Stream Sky Sports with NOW – no contract, cancel anytime